One Poem by Kathy Silvey

 

You Again

The idea of eternal return is a mysterious one, and Nietzsche has often perplexed other philosophers with it.

Philosophers are too easily perplexed.

When the warmth returns

And the sap rises

Eternally we return

To the scene of the crime

To home

To the scene of the crime which is home

We return.

First the mind wanders back

To a golden past

Of less silver hair.

Then you reach out,

And I know what you are thinking.

It feels random,

But is no more random 

Than a revolution of the Earth.

It is the way of magnets,

Of gravity.

Moons pull tides,

And planets pull moons and other planets

Into revolution,

And as sure as there will be revolution

In the streets again

And on the campuses,

And as sure as revolution will bring the nightsticks and tear gas and rubber bullets,

And as sure as revolution will prove 

we have never learned a thing 

We will never learn

We will eternally return.

Kathy Silvey is an Associate Professor of English and Education at Santiago Canyon College. Her book of poetry Herstories was published by Literary Alchemy Press, and her poem “The Storyteller” was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Her short story “From Alta Vista High” was included in The LA Fiction Anthology published by Red Hen Press. Her humor column “Party Etiquette Tips for Urban High School Teachers” was published on McSweeney’s Internet Tendency. She lives in Santa Ana, CA with her non-binary offspring, her father, her brother, and two cats.