She responds more slowly, moves
more deliberately
as if her body has made a choice:
To be less
impulsive, more
responsible to the overall balance
of energy
in the world. To be still
long enough to receive
satellite signals
that will navigate her
to hidden trails
maintained by those
who are too soon gone.
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.
To memorize obstruction,
or just its possibility
in debris flying from men
working, hidden patches of ice
on a side street side
walk, breaks
serendipity
into slivers too thin
to support the weight
of hope, too sharp
to be ignored.
Night & Day Poems of Amy Nash 