This week’s poem goes far with relatively few words. Its big abstractions, like “infinity” and “perceptions,” are made concrete by lines like “not one syllable can see” and “The apartment cube with 24-hour security.”

Mark Melnicove’s work has often blurred the lines between poems and visual art. This poem comes out of a collaboration with the printmaker Terry Winters and is part of a limited edition titled “Sometimes times” and published by Two Palms Press this year.

Melnicove teaches English and creative writing at Falmouth High School. His papers are in the George J. Mitchell Department of Special Collections & Archives at the Bowdoin College Library.

Infinity exists only

By Mark Melnicove

Infinity exists only

in the symbols we create for it.

Irregular shapes

are composed of regular curves.

A discordant score

is fashioned from dependable notes.

Though every word refers

to perceptions, not one syllable can see.

All is provisional,

even as everything is redolent with repetition.

The apartment cube with 24-hour security

is vulnerable to earthquakes out of sight.

Dark matter must have light.

Gibson Fay-LeBlanc is Portland’s poet laureate. DEEP WATER: Maine Poems is produced in collaboration with the Maine Writers & Publishers Alliance. Poem copyright Mark Melnicove. It appears here by permission of the author. For an archive of all the poems that have appeared in this column, go to pressherald.com/tag/deep-water.

Copy the Story Link