Again and Again

Take out the repetition
They all said.
I said, “No”.
But you repeat yourself,
Yes, I said, Yes, I do, I said, I know
I do.
But you have to pull this together, they said.
And again I remember Gloria at Joy’s grave
telling me to pull myself together,
And I thought, What’s the point
of death if we
pull ourselves together?
But of course, it’s for them that we must be
together.
To see it raggedy
unfinished, unformed, disconcerts; “breaks the contract”
Is that so bad?
This contract broke so long ago.
But you repeat yourself, he said again
“Yes” she echoed, “You’re repeating here, do you see that?”
I hear you, I repeated, I responded, I replied.

I tapped my pen and said,
This is like a set of boxes, you know, like a telescoping set of boxes, you know,
like inside each other?
You can get them at Pier One”
Glossy shiny blood red lacquered paper boxes.
Big red box, take off the lid
inside a red box, take off the lid
another red box, take off the lid
again red box, take off the lid, and then, finally
red box, small, smaller, smallest, take off the lid.
What’s inside?
A diamond ring? No

If this was a short story
Something would be in the box
But this is nonfiction.
And so there is nothing in the box,
and only the tiniest bit of nothing.
There is nothing inside the smallest, the last, the end of the boxes
You want there to be something inside that box, like a
diamond ring, car key, a rune stone, a plastic charm, even a folded bit of paper
Something, anything we can make meaning with.
There is nothing inside the smallest, the last, the end of the boxes.

“People are meaning making machines”, the trainer repeats,
tapping her pointer again at the sentence on the board.

So we insist there is something in
the last box or we leap:
“He was holding his orange juice and fell over and blood came out of his
mouth”,
I am telling this to a woman on the bus.
I tell the minister, “He was holding juice, orange juice and he kind of fell over and
blood came out of his mouth,
and to my new boyfriend,
“He was holding this juice and then like he fell over and blood was
everywhere.”

This is not how we make meaning.
This is meaning.
we don’t have to make it,
we just have to keep
Repeating, and repeating, and repeating, and repeating.

Perseveration, most beautiful word.
Er, er, er,
It sings its own songs
symptom of itself
tells its own story
But that’s the point,
they all died.
They died.

Like the boxes, they go on
opening
nothing but boxes
Repeating.
Take out the repetition?
I don’t think so.
Anxiety and fear encased in every word
Do you get it? What I’m trying to say?
You see now?
They died you know,
They all died.