kingdom of scribble and linger

Whirr. The invisible sponsored again by white 

walls—a joining in them and then (dark spot) 

(like the start of a thought) 

a corner, fertilized by shadow, hooked, dotted, 

here demurring, there—up there—

almost hot with black … What time is it? 

The annihilation. The chaste middle of things. 

Then I hear them, whoever they are, as if 

inside my wall, as if there were a multitude of tiny wings trapped 

inside the studs and joints. 

The clock dial hums. Greenish glow and twelve stark dots 

round which this supple, sinewed, blackest flesh 

must roil—vertebrate. A moaning now—a human moan—and then 

another cry—but small—

furry in the way the wall can hold it—no 

regret—a cry like a hypothesis—another 

cry—the first again?—but not as in 

dialogue—no—no question in it, 

no having heard—now both—no moods in that room—

no fate—cries the precipitate of something on the verge of—

all of it supple now, threadbare in this black we share, 

little whelps, vanquishing, discoveries, here under this rock, 

no, over here, inside this sky, or is it below?—paupers, spoors—

a common grave—the backbone still glowing green—

and blackness, and the sense of walls, and the voicing they 

provide, and my stillness here—unblinking—I am almost afraid 

to move—and the litheness of this listening—

gossipy murmuring syllables now rushing up the scales, 

but not really toward, not really away, 

as if the thing deepened without increase, 

the weight of the covers upon me, 

the weight of the black, the slack and heaving argument of gravity—

and her, quavering, lingering—

and him—what had been mossy suddenly clawed—

and everything now trying to arrive on time, ten thousand invisible things all 

braided in, fast—appetite, the clatter of wheels upon tracks, 

the rustling—what did I lose?—what was it 

like?—the weight of covers now upon me like the world's shut lid, 

shut fast—not opening—

and cries, and cries, and something that will not come true. 

When I stand up, pulling the heavy bedclothes back, 

I want to open up the black. 

Water sounds in the pipes between us. 

A raised voice. Some steps. 

More water in the singing pipes. 

And scuffling. And the clocking of their light going off … 

Debris of silences inside the silence. 

Black gorged with absences. Room like an eyelid spanked open 

wide, I rip it, I rip it further—as if inside it now the million 

tiny slippages could go to work, the whistling of absence 

where the thing should care for us—

where justice shifts and reshifts the bits to make tomorrow—

tirelessly—kingdom of scribble and linger…. What do you 

want, you, listening here with me now? Inside the monologue, 

what would you insert? What word? 

What mark upon the pleating blackness of hotel air? 

What, to open it? To make it hear you. To make it hear me. 

How heavy can the singleness become? 

Who will hear us? What shall we do? 

I have waited all this time in the sooty minutes, 

green gleaming bouquet offering and offering itself 

right to my unrelenting open eyes, 

long black arm tendering its icy blossoms up to me, 

right through the blizzard of instances, the blurry 

blacknesses, the whole room choked with the thousand spots my glance has struck—

Long ago, long ago, and then, secondhand, this place which is now, 

whirr—immortal? free?—glances like flames licking the walls … 

Oh blackness, I am your servant. I take for mine your green, exactest gift 

in which you say yourself, in which you say 

only yourself. 

 

[Jorie Graham {1950- }, 'In the Hotel (3:17 a.m.)', printed in The New Yorker]