Surges, November

by David Capps

‘I would kill myself, but I don’t have the courage’,

I thought to respond when asked politely, ‘how are you?’

We were walking across the Green, in New Haven,

and casually eyeing the naked Christmas tree, unstrung,

yet already stripped of its significant dignity. ‘A joke’,

I clarified, ‘A line from a Bergman film’. Maybe so.

We were walking together across the Green, whatever

else symbolized innocence and gave hope—Trinity church

with its dank stained glass and soup kitchen lines—the

little can-do model pedestrian Olympians decked out

in neon-green running suits and equipped with blaring

lights (what, as not to collide with other pedestrians?).

We ourselves, rushing to catch the opera, the opera to feel

so cultured, so cultured amid the howling wind’s urges.

I asked gpt how to cook an egg using only moonlight:

impossible, impossible