The Speaker is Listening To “That’s Us/Wild Combination” by Arthur Russell on the Occasion of a Kick Off

Spencer Silverthorne

0:01

A man stood booted 

as he fanned 

into sight 
with a pack
of wet sunflower
seeds.

His teeth were 

the keys
of a toy
piano 

restored after a punting 
across

this dirt 
pink 
town.

& what could go
wrong 

if a tooth already 
pinks 
in place 
of a 
spark 

0:29 

OCCASION SPECIALIST
Expect errors to mark the reams but time will tell if a cypress will nob itself out of the ground.

A mouth, chalked with

feeble testimony,  

but still 

a mouth 

prospected:   

0:42

OCCASION SPECIALIST
Well what do you expect when someone has pockets full 
of the slick?

1:16

I’d expected visits
from the most stunning 

heroes

who kicked holes 

with expired bean 
cans.

What a

lapse. 

Who booted 
a man

It was a moment 

not for holes 

but for circling
in the sand 

like a day
you decide 

a past thrall 
has just cleared. 

OCCASION SPECIALIST
So you’d rather be pursing? 

1:41

I wheezed
the briar
greetings
but he hitched 

some post. 

I kept
my hemming 
controlled

until the porch

felt less stomped. 

2:43

OCCASION SPECIALIST
The balance on his chin fulcrums on some verge. Again what do you expect?

3:19

Indeed the sun
had 
been hairy,

OCCASION SPECIALIST
Why insist on hairy when it won’t grow out of the sky? 

& I figured
the lighting 
would doubt.

Better we 
keyed on 
screening. 

3:22

OCCASION SPECIALIST
With all that time you think you’d misread a flared nostril.

3:33

So what if a moment

began when
an acorn
split to grass. 

OCCASION SPECIALIST
This image at best speculates.    

4:25

And moments like this
could sear the evening
as a recurrence
from the periphery.

& your man, our man, 

unbooted,

& how ? 

OCCASION SPECIALIST
A man stands possessed as if his recurrence marks a recurrence worth memorializing!

before he became
a respite for shadow
diminishing
with repetition

4:50

OCCASION SPECIALIST
He insists on hiding the source of your lambents. He speaks eagerly of snapping keys out of pianos, so you clapped fancifully until his feelings are suitably honored. 

5:29

Any prayers 
for enduring 
glimmer frosted
with the blades.   

How You Prepare for These Occasions 

You play the song, but pause at the right time. 

You read a line as if you’re truly there. 

Think of the thereness as some wave curling out of a horizon. 

The line could move in and out of its notion.  

It doesn’t want to clarify. It wants you to let go of exterior demands.  

There are moments in time when a character shows up to say something unprofound. 

Love is involved. 

Every time you pause the song at the right moment you feel like you shed some yearning for completion. 

It’s unending even though it seemed to end by the time the song ends. 

Each time you play a song, you hope it continues in another instance. 

In an instance where you’ll really listen. 

And when you finally step in, please understand 

I have no room in mind.   

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