8:57 a.m.
and still you haven't written
a goddamn thing;
instead, you have been pensively reading
the poems of other people
(most of whom are dead now)
with only the light of the stingiest window
in your woozy apartment to
illuminate the pages.
Yet, you wouldn't dare
change this. You don't want to
stir and risk dissipating the
air of quiet fullness.
You don't want to have to
stop in a few minutes and
attend to other things, because
you're getting it—really
getting it—that invisible thing
which you hope to someday articulate
is standing, for once, in the
very same room with you;
and though you could never
work up the the nerve
to say hello, you also know
you absolutely
cannot let it leave.
