Written After Watching 'the Human Stain', My Wife Sleeping Poem by Dennis Ryan

February 27,2005; Wednesday afternoon, October 13,2021 at 4: 40 p.m.

I watched a film tonight
I fully understand but can explain
to no one—not even to my wife.
Trying to is like trying to play
a violin when you have no idea how,
and still the violin plays.
I thought of my wife sleeping,
and she was sleeping.That's the funny thing;
I thought of what she had said earlier,
how well it fit the plot—
and how now it felt like a century later.
Finally, I thought of the couple in bed,
how they lay together, tried to understand
one another, how he came to understand her,
and she him, how they came to love each other
despite everything, and then... What good
does good fiction do when it fits the real so well?
Feeling alone with truth? The naked truth of experience?
Feeling alone with your values when everything of value
has been stripped away from you? Come, sit next
to me, join me here. The sequel is about to begin.