The Invention of Paper
If someone hadn’t thought of it
we’d never get the word out
about our missing parakeet,
and the restaurant menu
would always be written in chalk
by the waitress with the best
chirography. Still, paper
can burn or be forgotten.
The medium changes to suit
the age. I used to spend money
on vinyl. Now I purchase
electrons. It seems like nothing
can last. Once upon a time,
we believed in the planet-hood
of Pluto and the Pope’s infallibility.
Such things can be debated,
but our wedding tape
remains unwatchable
if we don’t have a VCR.
~
When Warhol was alive
you could still smoke a cigarette
inside. No one complained
that they were dying. It was part
of the evening meal. Nowadays
you get dirty looks for lighting up
at the park, and the nature of fame
has changed. It happens on a phone
and depends on decent Wi-Fi.
Each year, it gets easier to believe
in lies, and the price of cigarettes
is more lamentable. Nobody
rushes home for the next
episode of anything, and the art
we say we need the most
is an alibi for scrolling.
~
Diacritics
In America, we are mostly free
of them — the tilde,
the umlaut, the circumflex
and macron, the double
inverted breve. My tongue
doesn’t know how to say
these sounds, and seeing them
on the page feels like
I’ve mistakenly pressed 2
for Spanish, or some other language
I am afraid to learn. We have
26 perfectly good letters
to make our American noises.
That’s what the dullest of us
say. After all, there is no need
for nuance when ordering
McDonald’s or yelling at the TV.
The sounds we make are blunt —
like a fist hitting a cop’s face
in a doorway of the Capitol.
~
Charles Rafferty has published poems in The New Yorker, Ploughshares, and The Southern Review. His most recent collection is The Appendectomy Grin (BOA Editions).