Poetry
The Origins of the English Novel
Some mornings, waking early
in the business cycle, I breakfast
on serial metonymy and find you shipwrecked
on the posturepedic,
your body pooling up and emptying out,
your hair a metaphor
for a rainy day, and I know I’m ready
to abandon the gold
standard and the family pharmaceuticals
for a unit by the sea, the wind
rattling the windows to the rhythm of
prime numbers, the waves crashing
like waves only
then you lift your head
and the absentee ballots arrive
with tales of the epidermis:
the room begins to shake
off its dream— the walls
are white, the bedding blue—
and somewhere
beyond the deadbolt and swirling gases
a world grows cool and firm:
the changing of clothes begins.
Contributor
Matthew BroganMatthew Brogan's is a poet and the executive director of Seattle Arts & Lectures.
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