Dearest St Norbert writers and friends -- hope I get to see you come out of your various caves for tonight's celebration of our campus writers. It's always an exciting time for all. And there will be cookies. I can't emphasize enough the cookies.
Bring your friends and family. Hell, bring your enemies and expose them to a little culture.
Today's poem will be short because I'm giving myself a 15 minute time limit.
*
15 Minute Poem
Like toast, it pops out of my mind
lightly brown on top
and perhaps a bit raw
on the bottom,
and I slather butter on it
(maybe a bit of cream cheese),
chew it while sipping
lukewarm coffee
and dinking on my device.
Like my device, it's smeared
with butter fingerprints
and greasy cheek kisses.
A few crumbs cling to its case.
It's seen hard use --
fingered and flung and dumped
in purses and bags.
And it's constantly on vibrate,
which means I never hear it
on the rare occasions
when it happens to ring.
The 15 minute poem rings
when I'm in the shower
or trying to fall asleep
or dreaming about tidal waves
and zombies
or driving madly to work,
switching lanes without the blinkers,
listening to an accidental romance
(fuck these romances! give me murder!)
on the battered device.
The 15 minute poem doesn't answer
when I finally manage
to pick up --
it butt-dialed me
while it was in a museum meeting --
and I get into a major panic
when I call it back
and don't get an answer
or even the voicemail I was expecting,
thinking perhaps the poem's lying hurt
even dead
on the floor of its kitchen,
cat licking
its dull eyes,
so I call my sister and brother,
alert them,
and the fear spreads
dial after dial
until the poem blows up
with missed calls and text messages
and it runs out into the marble hall
in a panic of its own
thinking we might be lying hurt
even dead
Oh, sorry, we tell it.
We didn't mean to go supernova.
It's just that we got worried
we'd have to live without you,
we got a taste
of that terrible truth,
and we remembered
we hadn't checked in with you
for a while,
so we felt guilty and
disconnected
like the children we used to be
and we just wanted
another chance to tell you
how much we love you.
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