In Absentia
—for my father Is that what you were trying to tell me? That in every new meeting there is a kiss of death to come? Like in that story about the fox and the little prince who tamed him? When the prince prepared to leave, the fox said, “Ah, I shall cry.” And the fox’s sorrow so worried the little prince that he gave their whole friendship over to nothing. The prince blamed the fox for wishing to be tamed in the first place, but the fox knew better. The fox knew there would always be wheat fields, their soft golden shafts, shining stars to light his day. And I’m sitting here at the Mister Kleen Car Wash, waiting on the hot shine cycle and to be called. I’ll not be identified by name but by car, and I am reading a poem about turtles and swans and the dark spots death leaves behind by a poet I never knew until I needed him, so there are visible tears when the woman calls out, “yellow beetle,” and I exit to bright September sunlight to show the man my curling receipt. All this is to say, that the thought of a wheat field shining without you in its midst seems like nothing more than a waste of words.
Matt Layne writes…
This one hurts, y’all.
I turn 56 in a couple of weeks, and in many ways, I feel as ill-equipped to understand death as I did in my twenties. So much of my writing centers around the fact, the idea. No, the reality that someone can be with us and then, suddenly, in an instant, they are not.
They are just not.
Where’s that voice I only just heard?
Where are their thoughts?
Their love?
Their consciousness?
They were just here with us moments ago.
On Saturday, October 11th, I received one of those phone calls. Jason Baker, a father, husband, friend, and fellow librarian, died suddenly that morning on his way to a library event.
It’s still incomprehensible to me. Jason is younger than me, lived a healthier life than me, traveled, laughed, and loved, and now he’s not here. There now exists a void in the hearts of so many where he once laughed.
That’s not right.
It’s not a void so much as a room where he resides in memory. I can hear his voice, see his face; not just any room, a library that contains the whole of his stories and adventures and jokes and thoughts and loves.
Maybe that’s what memory is: a library you visit when you need it. Reaching high on the shelves to pull down story after story, and then, sitting for a while remembering the people you are lucky enough to have encountered, loved, and respected in this life. When you are finished, feel free to take the book with you. There are no overdue fines. Walk outside into the bright sunlight of this late October morning and breathe the apple-crisp air and be here now.
Moments are all we have.
“In Absentia” appears in Miracle Strip, released August 31, 2022.
Miracle Strip, a poetry collection by Matt Layne, is a unique hybrid of the written and spoken word. Each piece of the collection has an end-stop embellishment QR code which, when scanned, transforms the reader into a listener. Layne has recorded each poem, often with the accompaniment of musician and poet, Ned Mudd. The first line of the book invites the reader to “tell me your story, and I will tell you mine,” in the campfire tradition. In Miracle Strip, the reader and poet embark on an experiential journey of memories and the ghosts who haunt us.
Miracle Strip by Matt Layne is in print! Get your copy today!
Poet, librarian, raconteur; Matt Layne has been poking hornet’s nests and looking under rocks for lizards and snakes since he was knee-high to a peanut peg. His debut multimedia poetry collection, Miracle Strip, had been awarded the 2025 Alabama Author Award for Poetry and was named the 2024 Book of the Year by the Alabama State Poetry Society. Order your copy today.
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