as a type of silence,

like living

 

on an airplane

for thirty years,

 

swarmed by the roar

of engines, and then,

 

one day landing,

and hearing the plane

 

shut down. She says,

a city has its own engine,

 

and it only knows to run.

The input of electric

 

billboards, traffic, sirens,

the Korean missile

 

that may be on its way.

The world suffers,

 

while here, isolated, we discuss

the commonplace: love

 

or its approximation, a floorboard

in a barn with a protruding nail.