How silence attacks—
like a tsunami of
empty boxes within boxes
without the boxes,
an empty house we’ve
lived in for years.
What our life becomes
without us in it
is a foreign country
with strange customs
for tipping.
We pack for the trip
to San Sombrero by not saying
what we pretend to feel,
your face no longer in my mind.
When distance arrives, like air
surrounding air suffocating air,
you avoid eye contact
to the sound of tribal drums,
a ceremonial dance,
some elegant cannibalism.
The moon breaks again
into your eyes that won’t
start following me
around the room
like one hand reaching
for another hand
pulling back,
but you appear to have managed nicely
between threats of suicide:
“I just want all this,”
as you sweep your arms
entirely apart to everything,
“to go away.”
Blake Reemtsma is a San Diego poet who teaches literature in south Orange County, Los Angeles. He studied Ancient Greek Epic and Latin Lyric poetry at the University of Texas, Austin, and is a recent graduate of the Bread Loaf School of English. He is currently working on two manuscripts of poetry, Silence of San Sombrero and Ambiguous Morningwood, along with a selection of translations from Greek tragedy.
Categories: Poetry
Tags: Blake, hyperbole, melancholy, poem, poetry, Reemtsma, silences, traveling
Melancholy Hyperbole 
brought chills to my arms. so understand! thank you!