Omission [Ars Poetica]
Abby Paige
Tangle of stitches in overnight snow, where dozens of feet
walked past my window and wrote
(never the thing itself)
except those that lead straight out
to the clothesline where sheets hang stiff.
I've spent whole days walking and still come
closest to the thing at the farthest distance from arrival.
The mirrored box holding matches on the mantle
masks itself in my face when I go to it for fire, as though it thinks
I want to find myself in everything.
I'm tired of this art today, its judicious leavings-out,
its truth by omission
as in the city, amid grid and glass and
concrete, even horses avert their gaze.
Only schizophrenics go looking in the face of strangers.
Friends talk to each other's foreheads as if
to the sky.
The eclipse a shadow
casting itself into outer-space
The snowflakes—how they fall,
submit themselves to snow—
The loaf, wishing to be
eaten, refuses what it is.
~~~~~
Abby Paige is a writer and performer, based in Montreal, Quebec. Her work has recently appeared in Saranac Review and carte blanche. Her solo show, Piecework: When We Were French, will tour in New England and Quebec this winter.