Coda
The sidewalks we ran down as kids
are still there; I have seen them. The same moon
peeks up over the same trees
that do not remember me. The lake I fell through
one winter, still there. The same bank clock
blinks the same times, again and again.
The stars that peer up over everything
are dying out. The old church razed. Different
grass. And the way it feels to see it.
–
I have been thinking long and hard about the significance of poetry in my life and world, but I keep coming back to the same thing: simply, it must be there. That’s the whole story. When I don’t read and write, I feel disconnected from myself, and from others. What poetry means for me also has implications for those around me, as my friends and family often find me scooting off to find pens when they say something I want to later pretend that I came up with.
–
Algebra
2x is equal to my bed, and 4y is less than an empty
church parking lot. 36n is greater than the tornado
that uprooted my childhood home. q + 1 is equal to yes
I am going to get drunk in this tie later; q + 12 is equal
to waking up with this tie in my mouth.
49w is approximately equal to my next mistake.
2z is greater than the amount of time I spend thinking
about gravity. √x is not equal to the root of the problem.
2z is less than or equal to the amount of time I spend
thinking about God, and 8p is equal to recurring dreams
in which I build arks to carry us away.
2z is equal to the amount of time I spend thinking about you.
x equals your weight and warmth in bed and y equals all these
things I say. x is not equal to these six hundred miles
between us, and damn if y is not equal to enough.
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Brett Elizabeth Jenkins currently lives and writes in Albert Lea, MN with her husband and no children. Look for her poems in Beloit Poetry Journal, Potomac Review, elimae, PANK, Neon, and elsewhere.
