A Poem by John Gallaher
by Mark Bibbins, Editor
In a Landscape: XXXVIII
Wherever I get to, someone’s there. It’s
a busy place, wherever we are. Oppen calls it the “Shipwreck
of the singular,” if I’m reading him correctly,
though the day after “everything happening
at once” which was in the air back then,
we find ourselves making the same breakfast as before,
and the windows still work in the old way. There’s always
this lag-time between the first serious relationship I was in,
and every relationship I’ve ever been in,
with all our faces layering over the top of ourselves,
a love that is hopeless and waiting at your door. Winnie Cooper,
where are you now? Right?
We could ask ourselves such questions with impunity
in the past, but now, as information is cheap, these things
usually get answered within seconds, complete
with a picture surrounded by balloons and favorite inspirational
kitten. And when they don’t get answered? Even now
things have a nasty habit of disappearing. The high school
I went to, I just found out recently, no longer
exists. The building is there on Wolf Hill Road,
but it’s now, I think, called Saint Anthony’s. So exits
Holy Family. I suddenly feel a sense of loss,
even though I’ve been to none of the reunions.
You’re right, you know, when you’re seventeen. You’re right
about it all, as I remember hearing “Powderfinger” for the first time
in the cafeteria, 1980, and “Rock Lobster”
at all the dances in that same cafeteria. But I hated
dances. I dislike large public gatherings of any sort. All these faces
looking around. The mysterious needs and desires — the
unknowability. How easy it is to criticize each other. I can
see them now in their purity, their unfettered beauty,
saying here he is, “thinking” again . . . and all these thoughts
seem so minor afterward. Where’s the reach,
the achievement. Maybe it’s better for both of us
this way. No, it’s not you, it’s me. Maybe we can still
be friends. There’s a company of wolves at the door,
asking for you. Should I show them in?
In a Landscape is John Gallaher’s most recent collection, available from BOA Editions.
You will find more poems here. You may contact the editor at [email protected].