Read Only Memory

“Commemoration. Commemoration. What does it mean? What does it mean? Not what does it mean to them, there, then. What does it mean to us, here now? It’s a facer, isn’t it boys? But we’ve all got to answer it. What were the dead like? What sort of people are we living with now? Why are we here? What are we going to do? Let’s try putting it in another way.”

–W.H. Auden, The Orators (1931)

 

 

READ ONLY MEMORY

 

Life after the rupture

being a constant attempt

to return to quotidian games

watched by a guarded sense

ever since that day that

there is no resistance

no sea or air to swim against

though swimming

be allowed and encouraged.

 

People have fallen

stories and stories framed

in words bleached

at the edge

by electric light,

and again to no one we say

“Do not knock”

and make of our beds

a place to land.

 

Yet of other stories we remember

we were there

before

before

(I met you)

(in the meadow)

(and then there were letters)

(later we wrote and read)

before.

 

Set in my character

to remind you of a man

you never knew

star or wannabe

with enough patience

for a fat land

for summer days

you shut your eyes to

the warning skies.

 

All that time where was I

locked in anger

a wrestling helmet

that throbbed

invisible to all

another child in a waiting room

it matters

as men who kill call

themselves sad and disappear

into new countries.

 

This is hard to read through the screen

through the music coming from the computer

through the smell of exhaust and barbecue

through the wind chimes

through the rustling of the leaves

through the weight of my hands on the desk

through the turning of the afternoon

through the illusion of sameness of calm

through the unseen unheard fighting.

 

There never was a first word

never a first regret voiced over a grave

I was going to tell you

I was on my way

but am distracted

by most of the ways leading here

which is to say “the end

of the furthest branch”

where we are watched and it is quiet.

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