Losing the Narrative
A shattered bottle tore through my hand last month and split
a vein until every finger was purple and I couldn’t
make even a tentative fist. I used the other hand to indicate
I’m okay.
How unwise I am, how polite in a crisis.
In triage, an overheard photo of someone’s lover
almost 3000 miles west made me seize with longing
when I spied a palm tree in the background.
I understand what it says about me
that my body lustfully wishes to place itself where it was never safe.
I have put enormous energy into trying to convince you I’m fine and
I’m just about there, no?
Besides, decades on, poorly healed bones help me to predict rain!
though it’s true I like to verify weather
with another source because I tend not to believe myself.
I’ve been told repeatedly that I don’t understand plot but
it would be a clever twist, wouldn’t it, if in the end
I realize it’s me who does me in.
Copyright © 2017 by Lynn Melnick. Originally published in Poem-a-Day on October 26, 2017, by the Academy of American Poets.