Poetry: Nicholas Bon
Statement of Purpose
It’s important for you to know
that I’m a fucking mess,
that so often the drummer
in the corner is too loud
for this polite conversation.
There are people, even now,
asking me what I can bring
to the feast. I left my hands
at home & can’t get my shit
together. How am I supposed to
keep these walls standing,
keep my crib sheet hidden?
This is what I mean when I say
I’m empty as a porcelain bowl
falling to the floor. But even
a small piece is all it’ll take
to shatter a car’s window. You
don’t even need to throw it
very hard. There’s always a hidden
weakness. Of what else should we
dream? The worst curse is getting
everything you want. I can’t
pretend I know what any of this
should be named. There’s a limit
to my language that I find every day.
So often we sit, praying, uncertain
of what comes next. Every time
I leave my house I feel out of place
in my own city. So believe me
when I say that I don’t want any
influence. I only want to be
on the same beach as you,
us bronze in the valve amp sun.
I just want to be full for once.
You know that I’m not a sculptor,
but perhaps there’s something
in this stone if we can carve away
the excess. Me, I’m just excited
that there’s still marble to be
found in the world. This negative
space around us. A lighthouse’s
beacon defines itself with the fog.
Nicholas Bon is the author of My Circus Mouth (Ghost City Press, 2018) and the editor of Epigraph Magazine. They live in Tallahassee, where they attend the MFA program at Florida State University, and they can be found online at nicholasbon.com.
Image: thomas.vanhoutte.be
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