PLAGIARIZING MOONLIGHT
If you could sign your name to the moonlight,
that is the thing!
-Mark Tobey
Sometimes waves scribble their initials
over a path of moonlight. This is the closest
to a signature we’ve ever seen. Maybe,
or maybe it’s the clouds with their C-curves
crossing in front of the O—mouth open,
head thrown back and singing.
We cannot steal words if they’re kept
unspoken, but who wants to live that quietly?
Instead, I want to swim in the dark
sea across paper, climb the barges
and docks that float there. Moonlight invites itself
to our desks and we try to nail its beam
to our paper. We’ve been swimming here
for years, trying to steal what hasn’t been
written, diving to the bottom of an unread sea.
—Kelli Agodon
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Previously published in the North American Review