Some people inside my head
Are making so much noise
It’s hard to think. What’s going on?
Are they having a party?
In the middle of the day?
I bang my forehead
With the heel of my hand
And it stops. That was easy.
Now what was I trying
To think about?
Getting the car serviced?
Practicing on the piano?
Ordering a toner cartridge?
Trimming my fingernails?
Making a salad for lunch?
It’s far too quiet in there, now.
Are they waiting for me to think
Important thoughts? For example,
How it’s possible to feel fear
And anger at the same time.
How satisfaction comes from
The knowledge that the numbers
Stamped on the side of the tire
Are the width, then the height,
Finally the diameter.
Which leads to thoughts of the
Internal combustion engine,
Invented more than a century ago,
Before the rotary telephone,
Which young people have no idea
How to use. Just ask them.
Before neurology, which might explain
The people inside my head,
And the fact that they’re whispering now,
Trying not to disturb me, I assume,
But I want to know what they’re saying.
They could be plotting some mischief,
They could throw a switch,
Like the men used to do on the rail line,
Heave on a lever and send the idea
Intended for a familiar destination
Off to somewhere entirely foreign,
Where satisfaction will be distrust,
Where the engines smoke and rattle and the tires
Lose their air in great, noisy expirations,
And the rotary telephone is the sole
Means of communication, if only
Someone knew how to use it.
© Dennis Hathaway
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