by Charles Troob
Held captive by the whims of a faithless lover
I opened an app, found someone available:
brawny and sensual, seductive as all get-out.
I was going to send a message
via the app to Mr. Available
but my heart wasn’t in it.
I was going to send an exquisitely crafted message
perverse and passionate
but my heart wasn’t in it.
I put down the phone and turned instead to Proust
perverse and passionate
on every page of his long, winding text.
I put down the phone and turned instead to Proust,
burying myself in the whims of faithless lovers
on every page of his exquisitely crafted text:
brawny and sensual, seductive as all get-out.
This was written for Sarah White’s poetry group. It’s a pantoum, a strict form in which stanzas are linked by lines which repeat, with some variation. It was a struggle to put the pieces together until Proust got into it, and then everything seemed to fit.