14
Literature
Everyone I met was writing a novel
that is if they weren’t hard at work on a screenplay
six months of your life on a lottery ticket
like watching ones errors on some sick instant replay

And not for one moment do we measure the cost
literary novels about the holocaust
written in avoidance of our frail daily lives
as if writing then dying was the way to survive

I went to the window, I looked at the weather
tried to make a phone call, pen still in my hand
I picked up a novel and read half a sentence
looked to my conscience which made no demands

All the screenplays in drawers, all the meals never tasted
all the moments ignored, all the forests we’ve wasted
and not for one moment do we speak what we’ve lost
millions of novels about the holocaust

And writing or not writing, these are twin terrors
from what single error is all genius made
and writing or not writing – a single question
in misapprehension our lives are mislaid
Guitar and Voice: Jacob Wren
Recording: Radwan Ghazi Moumneh (hotel2tango)