{ Nick Flynn: Man Dancing with a Paper Cup. }

[delga]

Man Dancing with a Paper Cup
by Nick Flynn

You still send letters but I know

you are dead, I see you
wandering the streets when I go back home,

& I swear I am never going back. A glance
in the trash, a barrel on fire, my hands

pass right through you. You wrote
from prison but I couldn't remember
how you looked.

so the bars became cheekbone, shadow,
lash, pressed
tightly to your face. Maybe

the silence you move through
shaped me, the way

a church bell ringing resonates

long after the ear ceases to perceive it,

the way waves space themselves
until they stop.