Nabokov, when too young I read your Signs and Symbols the world folded and hummed and etched

out one great unending shriek, Fluoxetine

Nabokov, who now half-waking I imagine walking me hulking and real, my Virgil,

through the pulpy center of the Earth, strewn about in such a way

that would wet our feet if it were water:

To avoid nihilism, O Vladimir, I tell you of the smallest of angels.

A baby bird with a mouth for a head thrusting hunger up to Heaven.

Man at His Bath by Caillebotte

who looking down (I imagine) stands

learning and identifying every section of his navel.

We sit and watch the sun rise.

There is no other version of this story.

Listen when I tell you humiliation

comes from the Latin root for earth or ground: there is something to be said

for hopeful thinking.

Vladimir, you are not here but buried in Montreux.

Goodmorning Death, you great ascetic. Goodmorning Friday, benign and anonymous. Good morning, when I want to be wanted.

I am not someone

I had planned to keep on knowing.

The sky ends in air.

You told me to permit sadness.

O my Vladimir, to avoid the dark you only have to close your eyes.

Sy Noel is a second-year Creative Writing and Religion major. She really likes rhinestones and Denton Welch.