Inversion

He.

fears waking to blank mornings the empty apartment a white-clothed table set for one the growl of silence, a crescendo as the callous clock marks time like a metronome for his body to breathe alone in rooms where memories glare from picture frames going months without touch— only handshakes and jostled shoulders in crowds watching the youthful world pass below from his balcony, the mass of unknown bodies commuting, eating, cursing, flirting, living their lives indifferent to him, watering his begonias above them the television’s blare, a kind of desperation for the missing voices, for the chaos of life and ending his nights beneath cool sheets un-warmed by the naked brown limbs of a woman. She.

suffers from too much presence

the mind aches for solitude

living in a house full of need

she is consumed daily, like bread

people need her hands to do things:

objects must be lifted, chopped, poured

cloth must be folded, water boiled in pots

toilets unplugged

the voice desires to withdraw

but is always drawn out by her tongue

by gymnastics of inane conversation

the predictable things that must be said

she would give anything

to watch, unencumbered, the sunrise

to sit in her chair without moving her arms

making it to the bottom of her coffee cup

to its earthy black grounds

yearning for a day stretched out before her, free of tasks

mind withdrawn into symbol

to spend the afternoon swimming in watercolor

to picnic with God and the hummingbird

to float in the watery coolness of Bach’s flute

instead her mind is pulled, reluctant, like a donkey

into the prosaic, the practical – the planning of meals

the commutes, the doctor’s calls the waking up and putting to bed

why can’t she live for one day in the poem

she no longer desires youth, but craves old age

when for once, she might wake to an empty house

and fall to sleep under cool sheets.

-- Published in 2024 Poetry Society of Virginia Anthology. -- Second place finalist, Poetry Society of Virginia 2024 Contest, Family Relationships