If I could call
I’d tell you about my dream
where time unraveled backwards
and ask if you thought it
responsible to correct the past.
I’d pose a question
like a nervous run-on sentence:
would you want to get to know me better
could you open up too
and just start with that?
I’d try to explain
the sudden desperation
of my call by holding the phone
to the air to catch the cricket
and insect buzz
that would otherwise be inaudible to you,
you being mountains and airplanes away.
Their buzz is indescribable, I’d say,
then folly with words until something
like the following
would fall from my lips:
the sound is air leaving lungs;
a song as short and savage as the night
that exposes them to the bats
that streak from canopy to canopy.
From below this unfinished porch
that overlooks the valley
insect lovers call from the darkness
with songs instead of phones,
risking everything
to text through the night
flirty proposals, to embrace in the now
that’s the same in every tree as in every time zone,
to connect before the world
reverses itself a burning sunrise.
I want to call
to tell you this and more,
but there is no phone in this forgotten town
half-swallowed by jungle,
and I’ve ruined the moment anyway
when I translated insect to English
instead of just sending a song
in your direction
with this night savagery attached.
LOCATION: Cirquata, Bolivia
