Note Left on an Empty Fridge
Did you think words would be
enough? They stopped short
of every bridge
as though they were
an old man, arms draped
across the top of a tumbling
fence, eyes with that longing
look sunsets leave
in the retina’s arbours.
I wanted to touch, consume
the substantial, that meal
in a smoky, crowded café
tucked into a shoreline
of band. I wanted to
walk in the jazz waves
and touch your jazz hands
with a minor persuasive
solo. Did you think
a novel would explain
our convoluted plot? Fantasy
doesn’t solve every unsolvable
problem. We think that way
in today’s world
and we live the lives of clouds.
1 comment:
Hi Hw,
I’ve been meaning to comment on this. You of all people know how time slips away.
I love the somewhat contradictory nature of this poem—that words, (novel, poems, whatever) are ephemeral and transitory as clouds…yet the clouds always were, always will be, always are the same, absorbing, releasing their very selves back into the air.
I love that the speaker wanted to ‘consume the substantial’ for isn’t that really living? And yet the speaker slips right back into metaphor, the ‘shoreline of band’ and the ‘jazz waves’ because that is the best way to keep the reality in the memory.
This is a fantastic poem and almost every line offers up a gem: “stop[ping] short of every bridge,” the “longing look [that] sunsets leave,” and the humor of the “minor persuasive solo.”
Seriously good poem, I think.
Carol
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