Monologue: Frank O'Hara
Elaine Equi


Untie your muse
for an hour and stay with me.

I come in pieces
across a great test pattern

or maybe it's what I used to call sky.
The music is certainly blue enough

but not without its own tenderness
like an arrow shot I know not where.

When will you see me as I am
as industrious with grief as you are

clever at hiding your tiredness.
In poems we shine

and though we say them with conviction,
the words are never really ours for keeps.