Into this
collision of events—
an anniversary and
an announcement.
An epitaph nodding
at a long dead
affair gets plastered
with a bill blasting
a live
threat. A reunion
of the soundtrack
that did her in. She could peel
it off—the stone would still
be cool. But these words
are not.
If this moment respects
its elders, if I honor
the memory of a lover’s laugh,
silence, topography
of an old acrylic seascape painting
gently against my fingertips—
if
I could be so expansive
with what’s left inside—broken,
scarred, intact—I might begin
to understand how to drop
this word
nostalgia
on its head and see
it shake itself free
of the mockery
and disapproving stares. I could
touch it without leaving
a smudge.
Night & Day Poems of Amy Nash 