Armistice, and; The Poet Visits Lewiston Public Library

Abstract

Armistice, and; The Poet Visits Lewiston Public Library Myronn Hardy (bio) Armistice You are without shield.The war has ceased but the prayerplants burn in direct sun.The horse you rode is eating apples.You are offered apples in the morning.The orchard out back haunts.The temptation is to stay.To hold those walls that air as all of it.But there are echoes visionsof what won't cease.If she offers a mandolin an ear a soloaudience will you play?That room suddenly silver.Everything suddenly there. [End Page 117] The Poet Visits Lewiston Public Library Vagabonds haveleft without newspapers.They're no longer warm. They're now sleepingon iced streets.These streetlights expose our disgrace.The poet is protectedby men in blazers. They're lookingfor odd airsas we walk upstairs as we're seated.I know no one here.I'm a man in a baseball cap who has read newspaperswith vagabonds.Perhaps they believe I'm the same their kinin this town of addicts?I'm here for poetry. I'm here for the poetto read American.To tell me what I've missed what Idon't understand.She's kind. [End Page 118] Her words are clean.My arms are folded.In two years call this serendipity Iwill meet another poetwho's in this audience. We will discuss daffodilsthen freeze in the sea.I want to write the poet a letter.I'll see herin another town. In the letter I'llsay I'm a poetwho rarely writes letters. I'm a poet who'llslip on the wayhome fall fissure black ice.The addictswill laugh thenhelp mestand here. [End Page 119] Myronn Hardy myronn hardy is the author of, most recently, Radioactive Starlings. Aurora Americana is forthcoming this fall (Princeton University Press). His poems have appeared in The New York Times Magazine, Ploughshares, poetry, The Georgia Review, The Baffler, and elsewhere. He lives in Maine. Copyright © 2023 Myronn Hardy