Upper World
If sadness
is akin to patience,
we’re back!
Pattern recognition
was our first response
to loneliness.
Here and there were like
one place.
But we need to triangulate,
find someone to show.
*
There’s a jolt, quasi-electric,
when one of our myths
reverts to abstraction.
Now we all know
every name's Eurydice,
briefly returned
from blankness
and the way back
won’t bear scrutiny.
High voices
over rapid-pulsing synthesizers
intone, “without you”—
which is soothing.
We prefer meta-significance:
the way the clouds exchange
white scraps
in glory.
No more wishes.
No more bungalows
behind car-washes
painted the color of
swimming pools
Rae Armantrout, "Upper World" from Up to Speed. Copyright © 2003 by Rae Armantrout and reprinted by permission of Wesleyan University Press.
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Poet Rae Armantrout b. 1947
POET’S REGION U.S., Western
SCHOOL / PERIOD Language Poetry
Subjects Living, Disappointment & Failure, Sorrow & Grieving
Poetic Terms Prose Poem, Free Verse
Poem Categorization
SUBJECT Living, Disappointment & Failure, Sorrow & Grieving
POET’S REGION U.S., Western
SCHOOL / PERIOD Language Poetry
Poetic Terms Prose Poem, Free Verse
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