HOLOGRAM

Andrew W. French


        “A new geometry of interlocking octangles
        and we, watching it, interlocked in a strange dimension –
        that neither your heart nor mine could have invented –
        of multiple images, complex as angels.”
                - P.K. Page, “Hologram”

We go where hills stalk
untouched space, elude digits
of cell-service. Take a left and take it easy,
we’ve got nowhere to be. Feel Seymour’s dark
embrace. Stare at the pines. Forget
we’re buckled in. When you drop your head
and utter honey, I dedicate the night
to combing the hive below this peak for sweet treasures.
Watch long enough and Vancouver blurs,
a new geometry of interlocking octangles.

You say it’s pretty, I don’t
mention two decades of searching
for something more. Maybe there’s nothing
beyond stray streetlamps, astrological static,
whatever high-beams dig up. The city
has a loose tongue, tells its secrets to the sun each morning.
Come dawn we’ll stick an eye and an ear out,
see what we can hear. But this is it for now, faint whisper
of an illuminated knot working itself out
and we, watching it, interlocked in a strange dimension.

We sleep in the car and I dream I’m a lemon.
Would you pick me out from other Andrews?
This being is honeysweet when you dangle
from the right branch. We’re all clinging
to something larger than us, learning to ripen,
let go. We let the sun peel back our eyelids.
Knowing words can spoil
silence, we stay quiet as Toyota tires,
lub-dub over wandering potholes in a way
that neither your heart nor mine could have invented.

When we descend, you say mountains lose their mystery
once you reach their summit. I think of all the unsure eyes
tumbling down Everest behind boulder shoulders with nothing
left to climb, questioning what lurks at sea level.
I watch the rear-view. Seymour bends
wilting trees over the city. Early spring picks
the hill’s snowy scabs. I spend weeks wondering
what the sun heard, what it’s seen and knows.
Just wait for the gossip, a photonic collage
of multiple images, complex as angels.




Andrew W. French: I’m a Vancouver born writer and current MA student in UBC's English department. My poems and book reviews have recently appeared in PRISM International, The Hamilton Review of Books, Bywords, The Lamp, and Cascadia Rising, in addition to a number of other literary journals across North America and the UK. In my spare time, I host Page Fright: A Literary Podcast. For more information and updated publications, you can check out www.theandrewfrench.com!