About the Dead Man Borrowing Time
(after Marvin Bell)
By
Someone wound the dead man up like a watch.
The dead man felt along his crown and his neck with
surprise, running his thin fingers over the bones.
He was searching for knobs to twist.
He cocked his head to listen for the escapement
ticking away; but the dead man doesn’t hear so well.
When you are dead, thinks the dead man, you don’t
expect to get up and walk around for a while.
So the dead man feels like part of something special.
The dead man knows that occupations can be built around
this trade in giving life back to things that run down.
And also, he knows that there is a trade in beautiful words:
escapement itself is beautiful, and so is chronograph,
and so is tourbillon, enough to make a dead man jealous.
But he still feels bitten by the tiny saw teeth.
No one has told the dead man why they have decided to
give him this second chance at proper motion.
He thinks it is like descending
a spiral staircase where
you can’t see
the bottom.
More About the Dead Man Borrowing Time
By
The dead man is self-conscious when he moves.
Once you’ve been dead once, you are wary of being dead
again: and you tread very carefully.
He slices a Macintosh apple with the solemnity of a priest.
He eyes every taxicab as though it were an unchained bear.
Come close enough to the dead man, and you will hear
that gear wheel slowly unwinding beneath his breastbone.
The dead man is particular and fastidious.
The dead man never allows both feet to leave the ground
at the same time.
It is difficult enough to believe in second chances until
they happen, and even harder to believe that they last.
And the dead man knows so many things about time.
He tells anyone who will listen about the series of verbs
time is involved with: buy, lose, take, run out.
He says all you can count on with time is, it is always
moving somewhere else.
He knows what he’s talking about on these matters.
The dead man has a ring of unexpected seconds in him.
He weeps as he drops them one by one like sand.
He reminds us that a beach is a wasteland of jewels.
To have a love like that is quite special and rare. I have dreamt of a partner with the kindness, love, understanding, but... Great poem Mufundo "Untitled #1"