Sunday, July 20, 2014

Character (Meghan)



Character

I thought you’d wear glasses like Buddy Holly,
collect vintage corkscrews and Hemingway,
and we’d argue about Ernest until I admit
it’s been too long since I’ve tried his fiction,
until you point out that my diction in straight, pregnant
lines could be compared to his.
I’d find you typing at my antique table
an early Sunday morning and know you’d had another
vision, that architecture was building gargoyles
through your finger conduits for characters speaking
words you think you’ll say to me later
when your mind is quiet and we are alone.
And I’d make coffee and write beside you
because I want the muse back, too, because
experience taught me to love what you’ve written
without even spying over your shoulder.
You hate it, but you let me do it anyway because
you’ve heard the collaboration diatribe
and secretly believe I’m right, but most of all because
you like the warmth of my ribcage resting on your shoulder
better than the wistful expression you can’t quite read
as well as the paragraph I asked you to repeat
while I listened like a poet to a short not yet a story.
I thought I’d feel alone sometimes.
I thought you’d feel alone sometimes.
I thought we’d laugh easily,
that we’d hold hands in hospital beds
when it all comes to that.
We’d save our pennies to buy the moon,
pretending on clear nights it is already ours.

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