lights, camera, action and other poems by Amy Saul-Zerby

lights, camera, action

in a room as quiet as
yours is today
there is space into which
expansion may occur

when a house is this quiet
& the wind comes
in audible gusts

Wolf Blitzer is not saying
anything from inside a box
in the other room

that is no longer a box
& no one is even in
the living room
& no one is doing laundry
& no one is cooking breakfast

there will be space
into which
you may speak
to yrself

& you might even think
of your mother in
a real way
& it may even be
the kind of quiet
you’d forgotten was
your first love

& her arms are open
to you again
or are not

& yr heart is racing
or it is not

& you can hear
yrself aging
quietly

try not to turn on
MSNBC

try not to think about
everyone you miss
all at once

(they are all here if
you listen
closely you can
see them)

try to hold an instant
btwn yr fingertips

& fail

know that you
are going to fail
& try

know that you
have been here
so many times

& try to do
what you wish
you’d done
the last time

& the time
before that

you deserve to have

the pleasure of doing
the damn thing

this time:

do it.

---

blame

when god closes a door
he opens a window

and i’m like
who cares

and i’m like
i just wanted what was
on the other side

of the door

and i’m like
fuck you, god

but really
the door was never
open anyway

and really
the door never existed

and really
i could look on the bright
side if i wanted to

but if i know
what i’m sad about

then i know
who i am

and closed doors
are best for crying

& blaming god
feels good sometimes

but blaming myself
is an old habit
i have not put in
the work

to break.

---

alignment

not that i
understand
but that
i want to;

that i would like
my intentions
to mean something,

if not to you, then
to the sky.

i’d like the moon
to tell me
how i got here.

would like for it
to matter how
i got here,

if not to you,
then to an empty
room.

if not to you,
then to the air.

to feel that there’s
a reason for

something is
enough
if you let it be

i am trying
hard
to let it be.

---

About the author:

Amy Saul-Zerby is a Philadelphia-based poet.  Her work has appeared in TheNewerYork, Painted Bride Quarterly and Spy Kids Review.  Her first full-length collection, ‘Paper Flowers, Imaginary Birds’, is forthcoming from Be About It Press, and she is managing editor of the spoken word-based publication Voicemail Poems, as well as multimedia editor for APIARY Magazine.