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The afternoon I was hit by the van,
centrifugal force twisted beneath the tires,
the thunder, police.
I knew you were somewhere
in the city
but wanted you closer.
What can we read
from the punctuation of storm?
My leg sliced, my bicycle
beneath the dry-waller's minivan—
maybe I even said I wanted you there.
Distance, you said, is irrelevant,
the underside of deer moss
split with a boot.
Thunder from the east,
physical space upended, distorted,
a ridiculous, spoked moment.
I was thinking of an Italian bread we ate last fall,
how I'd frame the vacation photos.
I was thinking of you.
What we take for granted:
how the foot steps down
into showers, stabilizing,
how we climb over our lover
to the far side of the bed.
Darkness, a hammock for suspended limbs.
Lightning arced the tree-line,
my chest like candling an egg,
my heart rib-knocking an x-ray,
an afterthought.
Inexplicable without my voice,
I am limited to the physical.
How to explain I felt like a fever,
a simultaneous cool and boil.
Without you
on a sidewalk, a thunderstorm,
I was hemispherical.
Tammy Armstrong's poetry and fiction have been featured in magazines in Canada, US, UK, and Europe. Her first collection of poetry, Bogman's Music, was nominated for a Governor General Award. She has also published Unravel (poetry) and Translations: Aistreann (novel). She is currently completing a new poetry collection and novel.
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