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Décalage
There was always a décalage
and now this, downside of the world,
shift toward red. Your own personal
time-zone.
Or the lag
the speaker must endure
to be interpreted. We are there
already — you have only gone ahead.
Discrepancy, whose roots say
we rattle, prattle, creak or crack
variably, a distance sometimes
in (w)hole inhabited hemispheres,
other times stairwell, footfall.
Closing up gaps,
residual English spacing I must reset
to prevent rivers from running, our style guides
differed but the débit was all credit really,
endless, uninterrupted, space
between any of us no more than an
en quad, interword pause.
Tracy Ryan has published ten full-length books of poetry, most recently Rose Interior (Giramondo, 2022), and seven novels, of which the latest is The War Within Me (Transit Lounge, 2025). She lives in rural Western Australia.
Copyright © 2026 by Tracy Ryan, all rights reserved. This text may be used and shared in accordance with the fair-use provisions of Copyright law. Archiving, redistribution, or republication of this text on other terms, in any medium, requires the notification of the journal and consent of the author.
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