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Elegy for Telephone Wires

Matthew Schultz

When I was old enough to be left home alone

but not yet old enough to enjoy the solitude, I

​

would call my grandmother on the telephone

and imagine the signal playing along those wires

​

between us, connecting us like a ship tethered

to its sunken anchor. But I can no longer trace

​

the journey of my call as it travels into space,

bouncing off satellites and dancing through

​

the atmosphere as if no one is looking. Now,

our faces appear imprisoned like ghosts conjured

​

from some interstitial place: liminal, unmoored,

adrift on the eternal sea and facing time itself.

Matthew Schultz teaches creative writing at Vassar College. His recent work appears in Southchild, Warning Lines, and Glitchwords.

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