They come in all sizes
to unlock doors, lock them
up again. They open
mail boxes, barricade cabinets and diaries
from curious eyes. Chiming
in my loose pocket, they turn
security into a musical instrument
before doubling back as a weapon
on dark, empty streets. They anchor
me to the city. A weight inside,
they keep me
from floating off
the ring around lost
before found.
I am the outlier
toward a route,
I am the proclivity
toward disbanding communes.
I am the lock
picked and forgotten
on the storm door,
I am longing itself
plucked and mounted
on the den wall.
I am
without heteronyms,
without Whitman,
Pessoa,
I am this plain,
unbannered song
of go-low yearning
caught inside the frame
of a habitat gone wrong.
I am fallen
winged fruit
through quilled foliage
surrounding the roots
of our tough elastic wood
into another millennium,
a clique fallen
loud and brash
without an echo.
Night & Day Poems of Amy Nash 