The Singular First Person Poem by Sonny Rainshine

Do you feel a barely perceptible quiver,
a frisson, as a Frenchman might say;
someone walking on your grave,
as my mother might say,
when you write the word “I”?

Such a short, vertical, twig
of a word, perched there on the paper
looking like a Greek column
but signifying my very self,
a lifetime shriveled into a scratch
like a hairline fracture
or a healing scar.

We wonder why in almost all tongues
the word we use to represent us most
is among the most condensed:
je, yo, ich, etc.
It takes a lot of time
to discover who we are,
who I am, and you—
all the letters of the alphabet
and still we often find
that mere language is limited;
it comes up short.