for Adam

 

And I didn’t see that now you were here on the page 
writing poems too; poems silken with blue, fortified 
with a metaphor passing through. But I knew this speaker 
was you and knew there was so much about you that could reach 
around the metaphor to a personal etymology, one that could brighten 
and darken the poem without too many over-determined moves. 
But if you, speaker, need figures—more than language—who bless 
the poem’s grief with vantage points or an altitude high 
up, or bandages soaked in vinegar, sure then, let the speaker 
invent a mirage, I understand that too. It’s tough these days when 
anxiety speaks through the fission of thoughts; it’s the piss-pot 
of the mind. What anchors the fisted pronoun “we” in your poem? 
Something must. And another thing, upon second read, 
only now do I see how the “you” and “I” of someone else’s poem 
landed in yours: on that particular cited greenery. 
And these other pronouns know—ahead of time— 
to check the soles of their shoes and how to manage 
their homonym’s feet; moreover, they told you, speaker, 
how to open and shut the door without too much invention 
or conviction, which in a poem is rare.

 

This poem is part of BR’s special package celebrating National Poetry Month.