Nothing Made

Derek Pollard

The world behind glass is gorgeous

This morning and every morning

That I am afraid to encounter

Anything other than the half–dead

Flowers I just brought home

From Price Chopper

Whose stench of wilderness

Is so shockingly absent that I

Wonder at their naturalness

And then at my own knowing

That I must always play at

The game of naming

Which is the game of self

In procession and disaffection 

If I were to love you now and

Nowly again it would be a multi–

Track recording fuzzed with noise

The ringing of bells beneath

A single torn leaf flushed down

A toilet on the second floor

Of the Ellis Court Apartments

In Eastwood one block from

The Palace Theater that stands

No more than fifty–six paces

Apart from the gasoline–soaked

Pavement over which we last met 

In the corner of this most pleasant

Cage that I lock myself into

Each night with no thought

Of escape but of the most darling

And uncomplicated comfort

And wake into with a thrill of agony

Each night as it is made into morning

There is your absence and the welter

Of space unfilled by what is no longer

And the scent of lavender given

To me be my lover when she

Abandoned Paris and New York

To wake in this same place

Next to me and the emptiness

I have tattooed myself with 

The glass is clear and unfogged

In the cold mornings that abide

Us in this new tumult that we have

Called down to cover the soft muzzle

Of your sex warm and pinched

With delight this morning as

All others and all other others 

Were the gasoline flame to burst

Across the crooked stem I would be

No less surprised than I am now

And have been since we first set

Our toy ships against one another

In a half–dried pool of muddy water

That resembled one of the lakes

Abutting the Ramble in Central Park 

Some mornings I want simply

To turn the lock and step down

Into the world so perfectly framed

Behind these panes of factory–

Blasted glass spilling over with

Promiscuity and abundance

And yet I resist just as I resisted

That extraordinary messiness

I situate always between

Your thighs and the lie

Of our difference 

If you are blood and staunch

Then I am nothing made but

Ever in making and the adoration

Of loss we demand of one

Another with each shuddering

Breath drawn in and expelled 

This morning is lovingness

Broken open and unrecoverable

The safety of inside jettisoned

In a rush of water and the light

Of our shared panic