Bobby Bolt
Looks Like They Haven't Discovered Time Travel Yet
If you’re reading this, no one
came back with the solution we
couldn’t see with our present perspective;
this much is true. You could say I’m here
because I still believe in wishes,
still watch the clock for the right time
to ask The Big Ask. Don’t
tell me they don’t come true or
assert the power of a more proper
prayer. I wrote this to only you,
which is to say I wish you will hear me
to the extent that you might hold this
a little while after we part. This is
the add-a-ball function hard-wired
to the pinball machine of your brain
flipping on, all bells and whistles.
I hope so, anyway. I hope so much
every day that I am filled with it,
ballooned and marooned by it
as I crash around the room.
Anyway, I miss you. I’ve missed
you. If you’ve been rescued
by travelers from the future please
let me know only through
a series of elaborate clues
that reveal who will win
the big tennis match or when
I will leave the house with the oven on.
If you could tell me
whether or not I’m ruining my life,
that would be nice, too.
But seriously, go on being you
and I’ll go on imagining some sci-fi costume
you wear each day in your world of
inorganic plastic shapes. Leave the past
as you would some litter that’s just
a little too dirty to pick up—
yes, that’s someone else’s problem
and you’re someone else’s reader
now, as I cannot touch you from this seat
or that one. I can only hold up a glass pane
to the moment and record it, reviewing
and renewing my love for the ruined world.
came back with the solution we
couldn’t see with our present perspective;
this much is true. You could say I’m here
because I still believe in wishes,
still watch the clock for the right time
to ask The Big Ask. Don’t
tell me they don’t come true or
assert the power of a more proper
prayer. I wrote this to only you,
which is to say I wish you will hear me
to the extent that you might hold this
a little while after we part. This is
the add-a-ball function hard-wired
to the pinball machine of your brain
flipping on, all bells and whistles.
I hope so, anyway. I hope so much
every day that I am filled with it,
ballooned and marooned by it
as I crash around the room.
Anyway, I miss you. I’ve missed
you. If you’ve been rescued
by travelers from the future please
let me know only through
a series of elaborate clues
that reveal who will win
the big tennis match or when
I will leave the house with the oven on.
If you could tell me
whether or not I’m ruining my life,
that would be nice, too.
But seriously, go on being you
and I’ll go on imagining some sci-fi costume
you wear each day in your world of
inorganic plastic shapes. Leave the past
as you would some litter that’s just
a little too dirty to pick up—
yes, that’s someone else’s problem
and you’re someone else’s reader
now, as I cannot touch you from this seat
or that one. I can only hold up a glass pane
to the moment and record it, reviewing
and renewing my love for the ruined world.
Biography
Bobby Bolt recently completed an MFA at Texas State University where he was a 2019 Round Top Poetry Fellow and Poetry Editor for Porter House Review. He lives in West Michigan where he teaches English and eats blueberry doughnuts. Bobby’s work appears in Poetry Breakfast, Rappahannock Review, Pretty Owl Poetry, and elsewhere.
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