Apartment Story, Motel Story, Gun Story

poem

Photo by Matthew Smith on Unsplash

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In 1992, the neighbors across
the hall violently argued
on a regular basis. One
weeknight, he pounded on

my door because he was
jealously convinced
that she was with me.
I let him search my place

& he cried the whole time.
I didn't know what to say.
How do you comfort
a neighbor who is just

a stranger? A few weeks
or months later, after
going to the movies, I returned
home to my apartment & learned

that she, during yet another
ferocious argument, had pulled
a pistol & shot at him. But missed.
The police interviewed me

but I couldn't add much info.
Nobody was arrested. Then,
a week or two later, after
the landlord had kicked

out that angry couple,
I investigated their
now-empty apartment
& saw the row of bullet

holes across the walls.
It didn't take a cop
to see that he'd run across
the room to evade

the gunshots as she tried
to hit a moving target. 
We've all been angry
but few of us have been

that angry. I wondered
what I would've done
if I'd been home to hear
the gunshots. I probably

would've ducked, grabbed
the phone & called 911. 
I assumed other neighbors
did the same. Months later,

on the TV news, I saw 
that angry couple's faces—
mugshots taken when
they were arrested for

previous crimes. But,
on that night, I learned
that she'd put a pillow
over his face while

he was asleep in
their cheap motel room
& shot him to death.
This happened long

before texts & emails
so there was no way
for me to share
that terrible, terrible

news. I soon moved
into their old apartment
because it was bigger
& because the landlord

had lowered the rent
for me—a gunfire discount.
I was poor. The saved money
was worth the existential

dilemma of living with
the memory of somebody
else's pain. The bullet holes
had been plastered

& painted over by that point.
But the violence was still
visible if you knew where
to look. I lived there

for eighteen months or so.
Met my wife while I lived
there. Wrote a novel
& dozens of poems. A few

short stories. Sometimes,
on sleepless nights, I'd study
the bullet holes in the walls
& pretend that they formed

two constellations: one
in the shape of a gun
& one in the shape of a man
& woman running away

& toward each other
simultaneously. Dear
Reader, have you ever
seen constellations

like those? All I can do
now is remember
that couple. This poem
is an ode to ghosts,

I guess. But mostly,
I think of their rage
& sadness & release
these words as if

they were messenger 
birds: Dear Reader,
look & listen to what
love can do to us.