Nick Courtright's Blog

To call a fire alive, to call a ghost awake,
to call a ghost asleep, or to call it on the phone,

pressing redial one two three
four twelve twenty-one times
and always being sent to voicemail. It’s your first love

again, and it lives.



At what point does the fire die,
does the ghost pick up the phone and whisper

I knew you’d keep calling
until I answered, so now I’ve answered, what is it you
have to say to me?

---
from Punchline

Even the smallest bits, invisible to the eye, belong
To us and we to them. Rain is the same.


Leaving this place is hope for a red morning.
A moth pounds the window, in love with human light.


I walk through the front door, and you say
One day you will wake to find yourself finished.


I walk through the front door. Look at the time,
You say. Look at the time.


Your bags and my thousand flaming trees are full.
Hills fall over each other, rumpling their outfits.


In the ghosts between clothes and skin, so much.
So much, and our cold forest warms itself with itself.