inertia

Conor Mulvaney
Jul 24, 2017 · 2 min read

I had wanted to write a poem called Inertia, and in it
I would have told the audience about the motion dynamics
of you and I

I would have told the audience about us, breathlessly existing
in our vacuum, accelerating toward one another infinitely,
unbound by friction or outside force, dramatically
speeding closer, nearer, impact inevitable

If I had written that poem, Momentum would have made a better name
it would have spoken to my delusion that you and I were something
predetermined, as guaranteed as gravity meeting ground, that some
magnetism, internal, was drawing us to the finish line

But I scrapped that one,
new research indicates that Inertia
was the better name

Inertia is an object’s propensity to continue to move
against the grain, to continue upon whichever path
its sights had set

You see, inertia is how you stumbled forward
when there was only standing room on the 7

Inertia is how we couldn’t stop laughing
when your aviators tried to suicide-jump out the driverside window
when i took that turn a little too sharply

Inertia is how when you slammed on the brakes
my body, uncautiously uncaringly untethered
launched through the windshield and over the hood

Inertia is how my body skipped across the pavement
flung from your wrist like a rock on crab meadow
less splash and more screech

Inertia is how i continue to ache
my heart continues to beat
even when you say not to

Inertia is continuing to love you
even if you’ve fucked off

Inertia is what makes the brick wall
hurt so terribly when it kisses my face
with the same fury i kissed yours

Inertia is also how
when you come back, and ask me to go
i’ll sit still

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