Aphorisms for the Subjective Voice
by Tom Daley
Dusty, bluish, ripe as veto—
these pronouns prove their ovals
as a kind of leather. Democracy of selves,
banked against airwaves or clusters,
speaking in “I” or “we” reopens
the caterpillar tents which anonymity sealed.
“I” is a vaccine, “we” is a season of strain.
“Us” buys us adhesions, sheds implications.
Among the reprieves, the hellos, the go-alongs,
“Me” sounds like movement, scales the muck
of math or off-limits. Our tragedy herds our lagging
moments; Your tragedy signifies a surefire dispersal.
Impeachable assertion or impeccable silence? Speaking
In subjective elides what denudes and denatures.
“I” is a pig roast, “Am” is the single smoke puff
made by blankets importing plague.
Tom Daley was a machinist for many years and now serves on the faculty of the Online School of Poetry (onlineschoolofpoetry.org) and teaches writing in the Boston area. His work has appeared or is forthcoming in Denver Quarterly, Massachusetts Review, Harvard Review, Fence, Barrow Street, Diagram, 32 Poems, Conte and elsewhere. He has written a play about Emily Dickinson and her servants and performs it as a one-man show.
