thunderhead
Half a mile high. Book open. Pen drooping
in one hands; the hand that writes secret words.
Just as the in-flight drinks are served something
enters. “Sounds like dementia. It’s absurd;
ghosts and gods and stuff.” I’ve done deep damage
with my drinking; taken blows to my head.
Who knows? Half a mile high and a mirage
enters me. Shadows? The dark thunderhead
out my window? “Sounds like that Twilight Zone
Gremlin.” On Thursday I’ll be fifty-two.
“Vo’chinch,” my pen writes. Nothing? Good enough.
Good? I’m a half-assed conduit. I’ve grown;
not wiser, just … vaguer. Just ... the one who,
miles high, mumbles of ghosts and gods and stuff.
][][
Note:
Armenian, an ancient language I am forever butchering when I try to talk, has the most useful word in the world, “Vo'chinch,” (Ոչինչ) an expression that literally means, “Nothing,” but is used in the same way that the French use, “Comme ci Comme ca” — neither good nor bad, it just is.
