I lost myself again: a poem in four remembrances

By Jack Snyder

  1. Darling, / darling, / do you not know the vibrato / of late-night jazz? / The swing and drive / brassy, / heady, / bursting? Darling, do you not know / what rap and laurel-crowns / echo through skyscrapers? / Darling, / I am afraid that I don’t know / enough to miss you when you leave. / I am afraid I do not know / enough to want to come back / despite the mass of smoke in my lungs. / So lights up on all the old street lamps, / let’s roll the opening scenes. / Turn up the jazz / and down the hip hop: you / are worth more than the two hours / it takes to get anywhere.

  2. When this morning started with a / bruisy sky / and technicolor dreams, / I thought of Sartre / and how Hell Is Other People. / Who am I, / locked away from the world in my rain-painted room? / Who am I, / steeped in a water that remembers / a person I no longer want to become? / How long till / this body gets it right? / I wish for insight / to battle my blindness / and as I carry my image, I reject / the failings of my wildlife, / for only the worst make war and can pray. / As I carry my image, / my wish you were here, / my we’ll always have Paris, / I pray the rain washes / the coffin I carry / away.

  3. Hier soir, tu mettais l'eau à chauffer / dans la bouilloire qu'on a trouvé un jour où l'humidité / nous a asphyxié sur quelque rue résidentielle. Tu versais / deux tasses, seulement deux tasses, sur la table / qui avait assez de place, / franchement, / pour une personne. / Une église des livres a sanctifié / les planches entre nous. // Tu as brûlé lesdits livres il y a trois ans. / Je me demande si le feu / était sacré aussi.

  4. My anguish, / my musing, / a brewing decay. / I can only imagine / what things turned to gray / from this anguish, / this musing, / the shortness of days. / My replacement for purpose. / A meaningless lay. / Though my intention goes daily, / I keep hell at bay / with the anguish, / the musing, / the angst of each day. / With replacements for feeling / and lived shades of gray. / Only death as we know it, / unimpeded in pace, / takes that funny old anguish / and musing / away.