I’m trying to do the math; then he says it.
An actor becomes a narrator
who mentions the year he was born—is the year
I learned to walk. No coincidence,
no fate—just a fictional character
sending texts to a woman
fond of tracing shadows
without an overhead light.
What’s to become
of the Carnegie—its proud
welcome in columns and fire
places, not flexible
enough to withstand e-books’
mid-morning LED yawn. Even question
marks lose ground as text dispels
subtext contorts context contrives
textile streams this side
of the muddy—I’m gone.
Am arrivals in line with departures
without delay 80% of the time.
More than surface design, those fibers
take root in her mythmaking
self. Another one makes “we”
an object. She doesn’t know how
to plan B before A, C, or T. Monograms
were not for her. Not enough patience,
or that old needle phobia
resurfacing—it never really left.
Remember when
a nook was a nook, friend
and text were nouns. We were verbs
entwined without
unnecessary articles. I imagine you
the way I did before
we met—and the whole poem collapsed
under the weight of our naked
words. Truth is
what was stranger than
has been replaced with less than
a preoccupation
with middle-aged thighs. And I
recognize this contradicts everything
you presume. Probably. Vain
is still nothing
but a modifier. The end.
Night & Day Poems of Amy Nash 