poetry

The Same Old Figurative
by Joel M. Toledo

Yes, the world is strange, riddled with difficult sciences
and random magic. But there are compensations, things we do

perceive: the high cries and erratic spirals of sparrows,
the sky gray and now giving in to the regular rain.

Still we insist on meaning, that common consolation
that every now and then makes for beauty. Or disaster.

Listen. The new figures are simply those of birds,
the whole notes of their now flightless bodies snagged

on the many scales of the city. And it’s just some thunder,
the usual humming of wires. It is only in its breaking

that the rain gives itself away. So come now and assemble
with the weather. Notice the water gathering on your cupped

and extended hands—familiar and wet and meaningless.
You are merely being cleansed. Bare instead

the scarred heart; notice how its wild human music
makes such sense. Come the divining

can wait.
Let us examine the wreckage.

back to poetry | home