It’s early yet. Crocuses, buttercups.
Later, the hawthorn will bloom
riotous up and down Malcolm X—
no, flowers aren’t news,
but they can be shocking
after a winter of salt and garbage.
(The garbage doesn’t go away,
of course, just gets lifted
on stalks of grass.)
I want you to be happy again
but I can’t see what you need.
There are flowers that bloom in the dark.
We step into St. John’s briefly,
try to imagine the ceiling
before electricity, the columns
disappearing from all candle-light,
the roof a firmament in fuligin—
this another secret we share,
a language to imagine
before or after in the same frame,
a green moon, a dying sun.
What I’m trying to say
is wishing has nothing to do with it
even when you just want it to be over—
like trying to convince
someone to love you
who already loved you.
last living wife
If we are all dead,
congratulations.
New personal best.
You have survived
the last person
to misunderstand you.
Binary star
in a blank sky.
Event horizon. You are
the last frontier.
A new algebra needed
to solve this loneliness.
Your failure
outlasts all else.
Even among twins, one is
dead last.
Ryan Dzelzkalns has work appearing or forthcoming with Assaracus, DIAGRAM, The Offing, Rattle, Tin House, and others. He completed a BA at Macalester College where he received the Wendy Parrish Poetry Award and an MFA at NYU. He works for the Academy of American Poets and is the tallest man in New York.