Fifty years. Before
my time—barely. I was born
into a country
in mourning. Would never
know an innocence
once claimed. Never
know a world without
that eternal flame. Would never
hear that voice, that particular brand
of Boston accent live.
Sixteen grief-stained days
shy of being able to say:
“I was there.”
A basketball left
on a playground half
covered in snow—the view
through the chain
link fence. A typo
in a blog entry posted late
at night—the view
through cleared morning
vision. A mannequin wears
a flowing dress with white
lilies over a background
the color of the inside
of a grapefruit—the view
across an empty plaza. The lipstick
I leave on
this ceramic coffee mug
is the only view
I can touch.
Missed JFK
by 16 days, wish I could miss
that condescending sales pitch spilling out
of the guy at the table
next to mine in this independent coffee
bar. “Tell you what.” I choose
to be here in the middle
of an afternoon I have free. What is that
anyway? Structure
in a world post assassinations
and towers collapsing, in a world
where I witness car crashes
that could have been worse.
What is justifiable
fear? Pharmaceuticals
and a November sun
beams in. Lake Street busy but not
like I remember it when I lived
above the cobbler’s
and you were still alive.
You began the baby
boom—I ended it. JFK shot
your senior year—Lennon
mine. I will read too much
into this symmetry. We look
for patterns in everything,
those of us who have been addicted
to numbers (and such). Chaos
or infinity, we really don’t get to choose.
Night & Day Poems of Amy Nash 