Two Poems by Nathan Koblintz
by Nathan Koblintz
April 2024
Finishing the novel at take-off; For two marks.
Finishing the novel at take-off
for Qurratulain Hyder
Half the pages that remain are blank or filled with notes
of other books that I don’t want to live with,
so I slow like a plane at the start of its runway
peering down the tarmac to the vanishing point plotted
so perfectly ahead in a novice attempt to give things some perspective.
My favourite daydream is that I’m actually one of hers
living in the time she leaves to its own devices
between the vignettes that pulse like fireflies,
conversations broken off by the weather or by the women
bunking off to edit their radical magazines.
Instead the man beside me whimpers and the slats and flaps
go up and down. After the crisis the gang dissolves
in a mess of fates: her favourite goes mad in the hills
and the actress encounters her brother (me) years after the deeds
have been resolved and the land lost far beneath us.
I like it best when she lifts and upends me
so that the audience can see my workings
and against my melodramas warm themselves.
They come to hear me say the words that she knows best,
till, with a sudden coolness, she sets me at a distance and sees what I do next.
For two marks
Today I am asked to show that Susan is correct.
She holds her answer right against her chest.
My task is to select
the path she took, arriving at the place that she is in.
From her pile of secret workings she waves,
urging me to begin.
She is right because she is my friend and always is
but I must show some proof to the marking god.
It is no business
of his the talking that takes place between her listening
eyes and mine. Even in our silences we know
our presence still persisting.
Between us our conclusions are sufficient to affirm
each other in their place. Then we turn outward
where we must discern
the nice ones who pass by from the twisted and so-so.
Small-talking couples attend our meals, take notes
on what it is to grow
closer three thousand miles apart. Susan has gone ahead
brilliantly and I do not know how.
So I write down what she said
and underline it twice, once for right and once for good.
Her answer is mine, mine hers. This is our proof,
to be uniquely understood.
