Exit Strategy

George Murray
From:   The Rush to Here. Nightwood Editions, 2007

Tell me there is a way to believe it all,
an exit strategy with groggy murmurs
of nothing but rest and a quiet universe.

All I can think of is my child, asleep
in bed, dealing with whatever birthright
his dreams afford his fears, waiting to wake.

Sometimes I feel like Kepler, poised to inherit
pages of wrinkled data, but grumbling,
What a holy-fucking mess Tycho left behind.

Under the surface of the crowd's rumble
is a song. We could have danced, you know,
to the how-not-why of these perfect heartbeats.

It's true. You've not been asked to understand.
You've been asked to listen, and work it out.



First published Backwards City Review #5, 2007, North Carolina.

Poem 1 | Poem 2 | Poem 3 | Poem 4 | Poem 5 | Poem 6

George Murray's works copyright © to the author.