“Quickly Aging Here,” a poem by Denis Johnson—
1nothing to drink inthe refrigerator but juice fromthe pickles come backlong dead, or thincatsup. i feel i am oldnow, though surely iam young enough? i feel that i have hadwinters, too many heaped coldand dry as reptiles into my slack skin.i am not the kind to winand win.no i am not that kind, i can hearmy wife yelling, “goddamnit, quitrunning over,” talking tothe stove, yelling, “imean it, just stop,” and i am old and2i wonder about everything: birdsclamber south, your carkaputs in a blazing, dustynowhere, things happen, and constantly youwish for your slight home, foryour wife’s rustedvoice slamming around the kitchen. so fewof us wonder whywe crowded, as strange,monstrous bodies, blindly into oneanother till the bedchoked, and our rangeof impossible maneuvers was gone,but isn’t it because by dissolving like somuch dust into the sheets we are crowdingsouth, into the kitchen, intonowhere?