Gone are the Days When...
By Nathaniel Letcher
October 10, 2007
This stack of dirtied plates beside the sink
has not moved in so long
I can hardly estimate were it weeks,
months, or more.
And that splintered front door
leans hard on its hinges,
pulling toward the porch
where I once stood and flailed
against it, desperate to get past
some morning ago when
I was drunk and without my keys.
Meanwhile, miscellany is
scattered throughout the house:
like discarded calendar pages
wadded into balls, unwadded,
wadded, balls unwadded and
tacked to the wall again,
marking the days that
have accumulated
like stacks of dirtied plates.
I teeter upon floorboards,
warped, scudded, stained,
beneath a burned out light
bulb; it's blackened crisp,
still clasped by the ceiling socket.
Six more unmounted
lay heaped in a corner
given to spiders, beside a
fusty, splintered desk —
abandoned apparatus,
metaphor, or something...
About the author:
24 years old, unemployed, part-time student, native of Iowa City. I don't plan on ever leaving my hometown, but I have no plans for what to do while I'm here. Mostly I lie around and read a lot of books, only occassionally getting up to cook myself some food. There is a girl who loves me, but she would settle for Garrison. Or maybe she has settled for me. . . but I don't think the two of them have ever met. Anyway, I kinda love her back, but that word is a difficult one to pronounce. It is raining here in Iowa City, life kinda seems like a timeout.
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