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Television Static

   




We cannot ever know how a memory feels to someone else.

Better to acknowledge this fact than to ignore it.

At 25, I sat in an upholstered chair in a museum watching television static.

When sadness took hold, I circulated the empty halls.

I tried but could not stop time, of course.

All that I had once controlled was slipping.

Walked from the hospital, crossing bridges in the rain.

Met in the lobby to confirm an estrangement.

Walked back to the hospital, crossing bridges in the rain.

All that I had once controlled was slipping.

I tried but could not stop time, of course.

When sadness took hold, I circulated the empty halls.

At 25, I sat in a plastic chair in the ICU watching television static.

Better to acknowledge this fact than to ignore it.

We cannot ever know how a memory feels to someone else.

 


Laura Matwichuk is the author of the poetry collection Near Miss (Nightwood Editions, 2019). She was a finalist for the RBC Bronwen Wallace Award and her poems have been longlisted for the CBC Poetry Prize and shortlisted for Arc Poetry Magazine’s Poem of the Year. She lives in Vancouver.