nathanael.ink

and if I write a poem that gets famous
I will say to Judah
that we did it
though it took us
two lifetimes to do it
and a human sacrifice
to do it
still
I am certain he will know
from whatever place he went
that he too moved my pen
and that his mind still inhabits mine
and that when I see him again
he will not be jealous of any success
because he will know
as I know now
that he wrote it
in the same way anyone
writes anything
when the words are just bleeding out of them
onto paper
or onto some inky silver computer screen
one can almost never tell
if I had the thought
or if the thought had me

whenever I write anything
I almost always imagine how it will read
when I have been dead
for several months at least
and a loved one
is fishing for some pieces of me
while in the kitchen
or at the dinner table
or on their bedside
or wherever their phone
or book or tablet might be
whatever it is they pick up
looking for me
I wonder
how then it will read
to hear that I am happy
today
regardless of what I will inevitably face

will it console you to hear
that even if a bomb drops on me in the morning
I will still have told my entire story
to the entire world
and everyone heard it
or at least
everyone I wanted to hear it
and
I think
that really must be
all that could mean anything

to be seen
by those we love
and to see
ourselves
as loved

and I wonder
how it will be for you to read
that I know you loved me
and I always felt it despite whatever distance

and I hope that you can still hear
that I did love you
even when I stopped saying it

because I was afraid
that saying it again would feel like a chain
around your throat with your hair caught in it
and all
I ever
wanted

was to see you so empowered
to love the entire world
if you so desire
but

you got held up
holding up in our room…
and everyday I was so worried
what I might see when I got home

I will never be glad about your leaving
but I am glad
that you stayed alive
that you survived
somehow
and perhaps
survived even longer than I will
and perhaps
loved even more of the world than I could

my brain
is two cities
one built directly atop the other
each a civilization
that spans the entire globe
all their highways and networks
for information transfer

but a great comet came
and covered the earth with ash
thick as a new crust
and a whole new city grew
and it spread across the earth
but

once in a while
a cavity forms
and a square mile drops
and a cascade
of city blocks collapsing
revealing the city below
and all its networks still intact

and just like that
I can feel everything I ever felt
when I loved her
and wanted to be married forever
and wanted to be old and retired
and the soulmate I made of her
and in the absence of that
no citizens know where to stop
or how to get back
to the holy city atop

I like to drive through our old neighborhood
just to notice
that I need not be afraid of it.
I practice making space
for the pain of it
and I practice noticing
that I can bare it.
I find the pain validates
how I loved you
and love you still.

We watched them build that Starbucks
up the block
now I drive half an hour
to get back to it
because it is the only plan we made
that I can still keep.

I’ve forgotten your order now.
Something cinnamon?
Maybe almond?
This is the reason I stopped relying on memory.
I try now to trust experience
and
the pain of seeing our garden still in the yard.
I am glad to see it
and I am glad to miss you
and it doesn’t matter to me
if you miss me back.

I have this sneaking feeling
that sometimes
when you look at him
you see a glimpse of me
and when someone wonders
how they could make life more wonderful for you
I have this feeling
that you still hear me
asking it every day for what seemed like, at least, a lifetime or two.

I don’t believe the things you said about me
anymore
though I’m grateful for your eventual apology.

I wish things had gone differently
but if nothing else
I will maintain believing
that at some point
in some past
you did
in fact
love me.