Nick Patten © 2008 All Rights Reserved
Nick Patten © 2008 All Rights Reserved
The Theory of Vanished Destinies
(Why the Aurora Borealis is actually solid.)
1. There is a point when artificial light, like wax,
cannot be removed from cloth or paper.
2. This is the point where spectrum becomes permanent.
3. Keeping this in mind
a model-maker endeavors the recreation
of galaxies
and then the entirety of the universe
using plasticine and fiberfill.
4. These items become displayed prominently
in the storybooks of a young girl.
5. The girl writes ninety pages. In them
she hypothesizes about the color of rain,
and about unicorns. The books are illustrated
with images of swirling asteroids.
6. She does not know their orbits are made from fiber optics.
7. And on a particularly dreary night
you see her making flashlight hummingbirds
with the refraction inside raindrops.
8. Does your declining intuition
realize the mistake of your solitude?
You hide yourself from dioramas.
The blueprints cannot be found at the local library.
9. Moreover, your weight has crushed my atlas.
How can I separate, now, the highways
from the gray state roads?
10. I am falling off Montana.
11. Your scale is incorrect. I did not know the horizon was so steep.
Kimberly Abruzzo is a graduate of Emerson College where she studied under Bill Knott. Her work has been seen in Boxcar Poetry Review and Can We Have Our Ball Back? A writer currently residing in Cambridge, MA, she believes the world is very vast and should be experienced accordingly.