30 July 2008 | Vol. 8, No. 2

working on it

by CADE COLLUM

so i got tethered to

the fixing of things—

funny this jar won't open hot

or cold, funny this engine

had more parts before i rebuilt it.

it seems a mind

can be much like this

old bike i've been working on,

the one i keep mentioning

over the phone. now, the bike

seems to have a voice,

seems to shrug in its stance: impatience.

i've added it up, charted the bike

like an atlas—spoke, cog, sprocket.

something, though, isn't right.

it just sort of

half works.

you say what would the world be

without a script or a manual, a knot

to undo. i wonder

whether words are

a cruelty of sorts

or scraps of metal bent slightly

out of form. wonder how we use the telephone

to muster up a return, to fall

into the pothole, that is,

an apology.