Envoi
But it is not our wish to reproduce
ourselves through you
the reader,
nor to reassure you that these words are true
or where the line breaks there is a meaning
stabilized by that news
speech is assuring you
our plans are still the same
as when we met original in formal theory
by the fridge on the streetcar
beneath some baggage of your satisfactions.
Over this our patience supports you
beneath the topical tuck
which is basic
to a sand ruse for writing through
these intervals between
our disagreeable achievements
signed in the triplicate stage of the plainer style
moved on
(not much of it) to where
the shade from the ilex soaks
the officer in charge
by the octagon
in august
more or less.
Copyright Credit: Steve McCaffery, “Envoi” from Seven Pages Missing, Volume One: Selected Texts 1969-1999. Copyright © 2002 by Steve McCaffery. Reprinted by permission of Coach House Books.
Source: Seven Pages Missing, Volume One: Selected Texts 1969-1999 (Coach House Press, 2002)