The Sentence

begins with its subject,

          which is the sentence.

Track the sentence

          to find out what happens

or how it will act. It is

          the subject, after all. To track,

meaning keep an eye on,

          which is synecdoche,

part representing the whole

          of a thing. One

may track a package if he pleases.

          One may track a person,

though you’d probably want

          the whole of him, not only

an eye, or perhaps

          only an eye. Look how

the sentence is so capable

          of embracing contraction.

A him may function

          as a subject, but that depends

upon the sentence, i.e., A man

          is subject to his sentence.

You understand.

          Such syntax renders it like

a package showing evidence

          of having been tampered with—

 

Copyright © 2019 by Nathan McClain. Originally published in Poem-a-Day on October 23, 2019, by the Academy of American Poets.