Develop the Negatives
Merriam-Webster online now tells you
the popularity of a word. “Bole” is in
the “bottom 30%.” How would that make
you feel, to know that you as a noun are
3/10 worth following? There are so many
words that exist without my know-
ledge, but even on days when you can’t see
your breath, you know that it is still there.
Having emerged from the darkroom womb,
the spitting image of someone other than
yourself, rate the pain on a scale from 1 to 10.
How large do you typically paint a picture?
Are you more an urban legend or a theorem?
There was a time when a palm on the thin film of
your forehead could measure the fever raging
inside, its silent and well-intentioned animosity.
It’s safe to say I will never get back home,
that we will never get back to the focal point of
origin. It was written is to be heard, not read.
Do as I say not as I do. Every word of every letter
a type of keepsake, the residue of devotion—
a Polaroid.
