Lauren Camp
Summer 2024 | Poetry
Inaptitude
There was a time I wanted
to know what I didn’t, and I drove
toward it, to frame a truth
as a cluster in the sky, a smudge, half
a million bodies of light, even
the smallest trembling
object. Orbit. Dwarf. To put
the matter into me
as more than patterns. As a house
of time. As more than
the bruise of night. Ghosts
moving beyond us. If I miss
both parents, why not
miss the long old past
further back? Why not
peer more than 11 billion years
out and learn it
as some sort of order? I didn’t
want to right then
or anymore simply
see the slight room
of now. I wanted beyond:
the beginning, the pace
of stars, their brackish trail. Wanted
even to drown in impossible
words for those pools
far away. The scientists told me
about thrust and lift and logic. Me
in the stupor of this
immensity. I took to the universe
as to a jacket, wrapped it
around, let it make me a cover.
Lauren Camp serves as New Mexico Poet Laureate. She is the author of eight books of poetry, including In Old Sky (Grand Canyon Conservancy, 2024). In 2022, she was chosen as the fourth Astronomer-in-Residence at Grand Canyon National Park. Other honors include the Dorset Prize, finalist commendations for the Arab American Book Award and Adrienne Rich Award, and fellowships from the Academy of American Poets and Black Earth Institute. Her poems have been translated into Mandarin, Turkish, Spanish, French, and Arabic. www.laurencamp.com