Where was I, in what can
have been only seconds
between my ordinary placement-
the morning’s work
in front of the black typewriter-
and then the table broken
where my arm, rigid,
must have hit it, my
face bruised where I had fallen
into the machine?
I did not hear my cry.
Everything before and after
is clear, even the confusion
of names and places is clear
in that I knew it was confusion
and could speak knowing
that what I said was wrong
but would become right with time,
would become orderly.
There is nothing to wonder about
in the sequence of hospital bed,
of dilantin and valium,
of my name occurring
in the official morbidity report.
That is like life,
in which we think,
in which a question begets
an answer, and the surface
considers itself intact.
But where was I,
because as I think of it
now, it must have been a place.
Not a condition, not
death, because
I am alive, walk, pet the dog,
think what to have for dinner.
It must have been a place, where
as my body fell
cramped into absence here,
I walked, or stood,
or made love, or
whatever is done there.
It must have been a place
with its own earth,
its own air,
its own high
distinguishable night sky.
I wonder what it was like
under those freed stars.
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