Leaving

The reaction is fission:

cleavage, catabolic—
whatever. Irreversible,
favorable. So what

if we're breaking
apart? Entropy

is building like a high: uncertain,
dull, disembodied. It was inherent
in birth: fragmentation. I leave, I am

leaving, I have left.

How to compose a wave
of meaning? A pulse to say talent

for leaving? An arc
to proxy good-bye? I am nothing
but elements, rudiments

ecstatic, disarrayed.
We have a thing, and
then nothing. A spark,

and a swizzle of waste. Will you ask me
to forget there is movement? Things becoming
other things? Let numbers

fall from their places: let places
hang in the air.

Copyright © 2006 Patrick Oh All rights reserved
from The Notre Dame Review
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission