Start listing state capitals.
Or better yet,
go out at night
and count
the constellations
whose names you
used to know.
The assignment is done
not when you've named
the last one, but
only after
some kind of
dawning comes.
*
Phone a friend;
explain to them,
in no uncertain terms,
that it's no use—
that a poem
can't fix anything
that has happened—
that no music
is pure enough to rival
the blackbird's—
that delusion
is sometimes
the truth.
(From there, simply let
the conversation
rabbit hole.)
*
Just get
the ball rolling:
try confiding
to a virgin page
how it can possibly
be the case
that you know
in your heart
that there's
no such thing
as a soul.
