(This poem is a response to Lydia Davis’ short story ‘Story’)

Girl wants to know
It all.
She wants to know
It all, but he won’t
Be honest,
Be truthful,
Be straightforward
To her.

He leaves her mouth agape
With questions of
Did he?
Is he?
Will he?
Does he?
Or won’t he?

But she squirms in her seat
With a phone in her hand
And she calls him
And he listens
To her struggle
With herself,
Her words,
To be less nagging and neurotic.
Those things they so despise in her.

There is no escaping the
Desperate questions
We ask ourselves.
This is what
She says to rationalize
Her behaviour
As she drives over to his home,
His place of relaxation and rest.

Yes, she has work at 5 in the morning.
But no matter, as
This matter.
Bears more importance
For it’s a matter
Of the heart.

And so she goes there with
A pistol loaded with these
Impotent questions.
Finds herself faced
With more important questions
Of does it matter?
Will one or two or three
Answers ever be enough?