by Charles Stein

Ethnological Witness

Tribal people
tremble
under
      elders’
eyebrows’
           irritation at

the youths who
want to get out of the little
village and read a book about
the world they suppose
the book
knows

just as

in metropolitan cosmos

teenage girls

with avidity
read
in subways
lives
they believe
and don’t want to
go anywhere particularly

by Elaine Equi

But where?

It seems you can only remember
where you were.

“Now” is hard to catch
in the act

before it turns quickly
into a string of yesterdays.

Regrets?

Things you did
and things you meant
to do mix together.

It’s dark but light
in my room I’m still walking
down a side-street
about to disappear
into the belly of a whale.

by Elaine Equi

I’m sitting in space—

like a jeweled necklace
on a headless velvet throat.

I’m spaced out.

Each word in this sentence
is like a small town
where aliens may have landed

but there are long stretches
of darkness between them

and they don’t always communicate
with each other very well.

by Elaine Equi

(Undiluted delusions)

But you can’t sleep them off.

Dreams only add fuel to the—

Wake up, wake up!

When will I wake up?

Many years from now riding the subway?

If only I could (perhaps I can)
reach a hand across time and space
to change the channel.