AmLit Fall 2012

Page 47

No Work at Work Jessica Nesbitt

Guess 
I’ll spend another five hour shift 
in allegedly non-existent spaces but 
 David says they exist! even lays out articles to prove that when 
I’m sinking into prodigious abysses (read: 
FAQs: Figuring Yourself Out in Your 20s) 
I’m actually Engaging My Temporality
 speaking in wide and rounded generalities, 
so soon and listen 
 This is only my
 third cup of coffee, not nearly enough, I say, I
 bet there’s a girl at home waiting for me with a 
pot of coffee and pen in hand, 
ink following her forehead: 
wrinkled and necessary but
 patiently 
 she writes, 
leaning loops of handwritten notes 
and when I see her notebook I swoon, that 
penmanship’s so suggestive, 
even more so when she’s leaving me 
poems in the margins of a tea shop menu, 
illustrious and secretive and god, I don’t think I can write a single poem 
without mention of her, 
is this what I’ve spent four years missing? 
A love that will sabotage my writings 
with need, a hunger for her, I can’t 
concentrate for the wine in my hand 
that’s spilling on the floor in front of you, but Molly laughs 
till we all start to frown at my limitless demeanor that 
fills me up and leaves me reckless but
 These fucking op-eds have me 
reconsidering myself, and you, and friendship
 (whatever that is, am I right) but then again it’s early 
and I hate this weather and I just want to write all day
 beside you, not sleeping not awake, 
not sticking to the sides of the wall

Fall 2012

47


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