Tuesday on a Monday

Here's a poem for Tuesday on a Monday. And here's something that Dean Young said about Matthew Zapruder's work: "I'm reminded of being on one of those airport conveyor belts: one seems to be at a sprint while only walking; part of this book's stately accomplishment is its deceptive speed and extravagance." Yeah, at times it is like that. Click here to read another poem of his, this one from Paris Review online, which is like that and is, I'm pretty sure, in his third book, Come On All You Ghosts. Also, Michael Brodeur recently reviewed this book for The Boston Globe online, so you might want to check it out, too.


It Is Tuesday

From room to room
after you left
I wandered a while
in the hours
as instructed
I have cooked
the mushroom soup
picked up a paperback
I have read
but forgotten
had some coffee
it is quiet
I don’t know why
all afternoon
I think of you
in the traffic
the rain
peacefully falling
like some plastic beads
from the ‘70’s
when they took all the doors
off the closets
and our parents smoked
all night downstairs
and laughed too loud
we couldn’t hear
what they were
and what they knew
if you hate me
it must be
for ancient reasons


Matthew Zapruder
from Guernica Magazine, November 2010