The Precision of Numbers

I've been writing a poem a week now for a couple years, having convinced myself there is a Friday / midnight deadline to meet. (This grew out of my first submissions to Rattle's Poets Respond in 2016 / 2017. The last poem of mine that they took was in December 2019, when I was writing about Advent, goldfinches, and my neighborhood.) When I'm at my worst, stabbing holes in my confidence with questions about my ability and intentions, I say, you're only doing this to create a mass of poems, to churn them out like a cheap-ass factory. You don't think. You don't write well.

Which happens. But I'm not always at my worst. 

I do write a lot, often when I should be accomplishing other things: editing, emailing, cleaning, repairing, organizing, preparing readings or talks. Even now, I should be looking at a piece I'm editing before a 2pm phone call to discuss it. 

When I'm at my, well, maybe not my best, but my sea level, my common, my regular pace, I think, you write to remind yourself that poetry is always available. That it does not need to be perfect, but it does need to be said. You do not write for reviews.

This sounds more accurate than my being a thoughtless chump. Poetry has been, for me, a way to survive when I had no certainty. It has been the one thing I could keep with me no matter where I was sent. And every week, I remember that poetry is available, as it is for you. So we write.

I thought I'd share a recent one. It isn't perfect. But it made me laugh. *Side note that makes more sense after reading the poem: if you ever come across Tracy K. Smith's awesome podcast The Slowdown, give it a listen. It gives you energy.

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Applause for the Precision of Numbers

On the same day two of my friends

announce their poems will be featured

on Tracy K. Smith’s podcast The Slowdown,

two dogs pee on me in a span of two hours,

and it takes two Clorox hand wipes each time

to convince me my damp skin will dry clean

and return to its natural state, softened by germs

entirely unrelated to metaphors for my life.

This is not to say dogs piss on me often,

or that my friends do not write poems

more people ought to hear. No, this is more like

applause for the precision of numbers,

the way they can’t even crash my Tuesday

without leaving wreckage splayed in loaded detail,

the uncanny sameness of what feels unbalanced

and the certainty of happenstance.

I can pronounce of course a thousand ways, can’t you?

On this day of twos, both my friends glowing

on clouds the color of buttercups

or sterile urine, I scoop two cat boxes,

wait in line twice, swallow two Tylenol.

I eat double breakfast on this day, having forgotten

my 5am toast by 9, though I am only ashamed

once, briefly, in the car, when I realize

my mistake under a yellow light.

My daughter puts both her shoes on

after being asked only twice, just this day.

Okay, I made that up. It isn’t true.

I spend two months out of twelve asking

where are your shoes. But you understand.

Can’t you hear me clapping wildly

from where you’re reading,

my two eyes wide and sleeves rolled up,

arms ready to embrace my friends

who sail toward me on puffs of clover,

ready to share their math?