---
title: And
genre: verse

epigraph:
    content: |
        "What is your favorite word?"

        "And.  It is so hopeful."
    attrib: Margaret Atwood
    link: 'http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2011/oct/28/margaret-atwood-q-a'

project:
    title: Elegies for alternate selves
    css: elegies
    order: 3
    next:
    - title: Words and meaning
      link: words-meaning
    prev:
    - title: How to read this
      link: howtoread
...

And you were there in the start of it all \
and you folded your [hands like little doves][] \
that would fly away like an afterthought \
and you turned to me the window light on your face \
and you asked me something that I did not recognize \
like a great throng of people who are not you \
and I asked are we in a [church][] \
and you answered with the look on your face \
of someone [grieving something gone][] for years \
 but that they had been reminded of \
by a catch in the light or in someone's voice \
and I think maybe it could have been mine \
and I looked away thickly my head was in jelly \
and I didn't get an answer from you but I got one

I looked at the man in front of us with glasses \
he was speaking and holding a book \
and I didn't understand him he was far away \
and I could tell I was missing something important \
and you nodded to yourself at something he said

[church]: boar.html
[grieving something gone]: roughgloves.html
[hands like little doves]: cold-wind.html