the destroyer > text > Nate Pritts
TWO POEMS
When there is talking
there is for me
a cycling to ascertain what is being said
or also to seize the utterance
& drive it slowly & with force
to a location of meaning
that is built
accumulated.
I worry that you can only know me through talking
& that talking is imperfect.
I worry that my question is wrong
& that when you help me see myself we are on the couch
the streetlights coming on
though it’s not that late.
Even if I can’t ever listen enough to know you
or tell you all of me
we can at least share that attempt
as we are here with our bodies
pressed quietly against each other.
I’m led to say certain things by trajectory
this talking already initiated
& these things
are things I might not / otherwise say
so is initiated a meeting / radical combinations
where divergent elements have split.
I don’t know who
I’m talking to when I say things like that
I don’t know who I am / expecting to listen
or who I am hoping will be listening.
I am pinning too much / on hope
& forgetting about intention
or I am misconstruing
my own inner life. Sometimes
the feeling is so right that I close my eyes
to keep the simple air undisturbed.
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