CROSSTALK

87.9: a woman is crying about a man named Earl,
her voice thin as a coat hanger, then gone.

kkkhhhhh...

91.2: a preacher says, “God will...”
and the rest is swallowed whole, static eating the words
like a moth eats a coat in the dark.

...hhhkkkk...

I am turning the dial with two fingers,
the way you'd turn a key in a lock
that doesn't open, that was never meant to open,
just to make a small satisfying click.

94.5: a song I loved at fifteen, half a chorus,
the part where the drums come in,
and then the drums don't come in,
just a hiss like rain hitting a tin roof
that isn't there.

ssssssssssssss

This is the sound of every unfinished sentence
you left on my machine. This is the sound
of my grandmother's hearing aid the year
she stopped answering to her name.
This is the sound the sky makes
between one thought and the next.

kkkh... are you... kkkh... still... kkkhhh...

I used to think static was empty.
Now I think it's the sound of everything
arriving at once and canceling itself out,
a thousand stations fighting for the same
inch of air, none of them winning,
all of them insisting.

99.9: clear as a bell, a man selling knives.
Never needs sharpening, he says,
and for one bright unbroken second
I believe him completely.

Then the signal drifts an inch to the left
and he's gone too, folded back
into the grey, and I am left
holding the dial, holding my own
held breath, waiting for a voice
that isn't reaching me
to keep almost reaching me.

The small hairs on my arm
are already standing up,
already certain
something is coming through.