An End to Counting

by James Como (May 2021)

The Man in the Carriage II, Walter Gramatté, 1920

Is there any little thing we don’t count? 
Money, weight, nuts in a bowl? Well:
birthdays included I am
concluded and far beyond vexed.

You see, I’ve been an actor dressing
the parts, but not undressing for the
next, instead fitting that new costume
over the old. Too many to guess.

So, now, I disrobe. How old,
how many outfits, how much acting?
Now, uncostumed—you know what’s next—
There is no one to unfold.

A shadow disappearing at noon or
midnight (no matter), I no longer count.

Table of Contents

_________________________________
James Como is the author of The Tongue is Also a Fire: Essays on Conversation, Rhetoric and the Transmission of Culture . . . and on C. S. Lewis (New English Review Press, 2015). His most recent books are C. S. Lewis: a Very Short Introduction (Oxford, 2019) and The Folk Tales of Brusco and Giovanni, in three books (KDP, 2020)

Follow NER on Twitter @NERIconoclast