Today's poem is by Claire Millikin

Rilke's Telephone
       

What I'm trying to learn
from Rilke's telephone is how to enter the dark house
of forest with its roots in earth and our roots in earth
and live through it.

Rilke never lived anywhere really, he drifted,
having sex with wealthy women, but in that motel room
we only slept with each other and got nothing for it.
The car broke down

and I was still wearing the clothes mother gave me.
Rilke didn't like the telephone, I've read (maybe that's apocryphal),
didn't like the voice separated from the body,
the word stanched from time—

to hear every word but never heal the wound.
We got out of the car,
winter forest swaying in its bones, a hard timbre,
and we were talking quietly, walking farther

as cold unknowing set into us.
Found a motel room and holed up, almost nowhere.
Made a phone call so Uncle sent money, with desperate love,
and we bought a new car and ruined ourselves.

Copyright © 2025 Claire Millikin All rights reserved
from Magicicada
Unicorn Press
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission