Joshua Keiter

Underneath the grass
there is a voice I’ve heard
whisper only occasionally
but long enough to notice
that among the twigs
and stones, roots and branches,
lies an altogether undisturbed
reality unknown to us,
a bridge to a certain recognition
that we are not alone,
that our utterances take shape
in the form of frail bodies
huddled together in the cold dark
of what cannot be seen,
what cannot be touched with human eyes,
but penetrates our existence
with a force that reckons us
to banish the grace from sight,
to only know the turning curve of the earth
when we can see ourselves among the dirt.

No one walks this stretch
of pavement, at least not
this hour of day. You can tell
by the uninterrupted shadows
that even if the street
were populated with citizens,
it would be difficult to make
them out. But as I said,
no one walks here. It’s almost
an unwritten rule, although
I am inclined to believe
a conspiracy is transpiring
and if only I knew what everyone
else knew, I’d know better
than to be walking on the pavement
at this hour of day. I’ll walk
faster, but that won’t make
a difference, it only gives the shadows
more of a chance to reclaim what is
rightfully theirs. As if I were there.

Before we begin let me just.
If you give me a moment I could.
Let’s turn to the thing we said.
No it was after that.
Yes, really. Was there only.
We had it for a second there.
I wasn’t going to. Oh I see.
Yes there might have been.
You mean you haven’t seen.
Oh it was long ago.
No it was after that.
You mean to tell me.
It escaped my frame of reference.
And I wanted to say.
Is this coming to a question.
How do you know. That’s right.
You’ve said that already.
Yes. We’ve established that.
No it was after that.
What do you mean.

Who are you? When did you get
here? Were you here last week?
Did you sign in? Are you English?
Did I piss you off last week?
Because I was told I pissed some
people off last week. Didn’t I
explain this to you yet?
I didn’t? What time is it?
You mean I have to do this again?
Where’s that piece of paper?
You mean you don’t have it either?
That’s a snafu on my part.
Where were we? You just walked in.
Who are you? Alright. We have
a number of options. And I have
to tell you, they’re not all pleasant.
What did you say? Are you the one
I pissed off last week? Okay,
I’m sorry. I can’t be all sweetness
and light. Okay. Here’s the deal.

I could have kept going.
But there were other cycles
in the sequence. And my strength
has always been invested
in the perpetual alarm of
crosseyed nosehairs, some
irrepressible, and some just
ready to be trimmed. If you let
them grow, before you know it
you’d be overrun with temptations
accounting for the harsh sound
of obsolete vinyl, and the birth
pangs of skateboard existentialists.
They said if you have to choose
to cross the street, it’s already too late.
There was something I wanted to mistake,
but that’s no deliberate anachronism,
more like the feeling you get when
you realize that everything is made of holes
and we can’t even get acquainted with them.

I never said I didn’t have
a hero. Only that I am overly
qualified for the mass hysteria
surrounding the unveiling
of bridges or birthday cakes.
I tend to be the quiet one
in the back, wearing a falsetto
or a drumset for a necktie.
And there are other butters
to be bageled, too. For instance,
if x signifies the distance
a train has to travel to get to
point y, then how many licks
does it take to get to the center
of what can only be described
as a circumference gone haywire?
I’m past the perfunctory nature
of digressions passing for clarity.
That’s my hand waving, so you’ll
forgive me for not shaking yours.

I am in the business
of fragmenting shores
that have already been ruined.
You wouldn’t believe the crap
that passes for epiphany
or ritual these days.
For some absurd prolific reason
there is a preponderance
of excess staining our sheets
and like it or not it’s not going away.
No matter how much detergent
still resides under the kitchen sink.
I’ve searched the index,
there’s no going back, not even
if we claim our end is our beginning.
Somebody left this statue in the road
and until it turns into a pothole
there’s no way I’m swerving around it.
This stuttering reticence
will have to do. So be it.

I cannot remember the last time
I first saw your face.
But if I were to guess
it would be the moment
I couldn’t identify your features
or distinguish them from any
other synapse. Even though
you are gone to me now
I hold your absence as I would
any other skirmish of air
or handful of glass that used
to carry our reflection.
Somehow you ask me about
the beginning of religion
and I said that it starts
at the back of the throat
and ends with the lips.
We only hear the vowels between
which distracts us from knowing.
And so we embrace. We touch.

I tried to tell you I wasn’t
young enough to know
a squeaky voice signified
exasperation with something
more commonly attributed
to the rigors of puberty.
Just look at that kid
on the video screen.
He doesn’t know what will happen
next, much less that years
later I would look
at his performance and cringe
at the thought of owning
a piece of this history. Luckily
now I can simply press stop
and put an end to this charade.
You think he doesn’t know that?
Watch him turn his back
to the camera to speak with someone
obscured by his body.

You’ve already convinced me
that this abundance of buildings
obscures an artificial resonance
between your eyes and what
they can see. I liken it
to waking up without opening your eyes.
It’s that superficial. But I am
repeating myself. What is there
to gain from tearing down
this apparent structure? Only the past
is there for judging. The present
is yet undetermined. If I had
a jacket I would wear it sometimes
so that I could hang it eventually.
A chair would make a good frame.
Only leaning. You said these buildings
are like words, just that they stagger
one on top of another. So that you cannot
distinguish where one ends and the other
begins. Call it a wrecking crew.