The only part that’s true
is
the river. It rushes in
an early thaw. She walks down
to the rhythm
of let’s pretend
he sees it too, his boots
hitting her off
beat just so. Someone might walk
this way down
there to make an honest woman of her. How
would she know?
Sappho’s poems. Nick Drake’s last
songs. Tiger reserves. My memories, his,
that pier over bay
water. A hearse afloat. The underside
of a bridge. One car
on a train crossing
this river. The moon
most nights. Your love.
My faith. The sky itself.
I see it rained, but
I didn’t see it
rain. I’ve been lost
inside warm, closed
rooms of sleep, leaving
a map of dreams
undrawn. When I say
I had none, how
can anyone know
for sure? I reserve
that certain cartography
for these scenes traveling
through my wakeful self—
put into motion
by that Townes Van Zandt
song today. Yesterday,
it might have been yours.
You could look it up.
Sometimes at civil dusk I look
at this grid of six
repetitions of your half-opened
mouth and most
of your face and believe
I have lost
perspective.
It’s not a stone
against this pane.
It’s that blade hitting it—
dirt of my life
dripping down.
One day this unstable
wooden chair will collapse.
It may be she got her day
dream come true too early.
Can she be
satisfied with these ones
she unpacks now
remaining where they began—
balanced on the teetering
legs of her imagination? One
voice is terrible
beauty enough. Or, grace is
wood turning
to wings at the last
possible moment.
This light has no logic.
It heats up tinted
images of you wrapping
around the walls
inside my solar
of make believe. No outside
truth will seep through
to stain your well-defined
face. The moment talked about,
its contracting destination
point, hangs
in suspension. We
don’t get there
from here. And that word
I meant to say, but
didn’t dare, is the only way
to arrive at your timbre. It’s up
there too, with its swinging “y”
tail making an underline
exclamation beneath
its other three
letters. They’re up
there to whip subtle
movements off
their hinges. Big,
bold, block pronouncements
too heavy not to fall
eventually.
Your handwriting.
His song. My memo
pad. This spiral
belongs to all
of us and no one
can touch it
without losing a grip
on how we get
sequenced
without a true set list.
And still the memorization
gets passed on.
I am a page torn
but not easily removed
from the journal
you didn’t keep. I’m
a face in the crowd
you can’t look at
but recognize
with your eyes closed. I’m
the book you bought, thought
you’d devour, never read.
I’m the last word
you wish to utter.
I’m that regret.
Accidents no longer
mistakes. Nothing
about buildings or fences,
not another bridge,
a scrap of graffiti rides
out on the 11:45 train. Her net
is small, her heart large. She just wants
to take a closer look
then let you go.
Night & Day Poems of Amy Nash 