Piotr Gwiazda
Daylight Saving
Stonington, Connecticut
1
The clouds have parted. A boat returns to the harbor. In October, blue is the opposite of
blue. A tern. The violence of the visible: always a distraction, always a confusion.
Something gets crowded out. But what?2
A man and a woman appear, walk to the end of the wharf, sit down on a bench. He
smokes a cigarette, she sends a text message. During sleep I talk in a language no one
understands. Ten minutes later, they are gone.3
Time is a prison, said Nabokov. He could remember shades of shadow. I remember
intensities of light: the glow of the moon last evening, as I walked up and down Water
Street. The shine of last autumn’s lamp.4
The color of yesterday is gray. The color of last week is green, with thin streaks of
yellow. Last year is of a fading color, the kind I’ll never see again. The air feels like a
knife blade. A perfect day, split in half.5
A day in the life of . . . In my mind I have an image of a poet who no longer exists. In my
hand I hold the key to his apartment. Why do we forget so much, year after year? The
apartment replies with pebbles and stars.
