Susan Will

Nowhere Man, please listen.
You don’t know what you’re missing…
Nowhere Man, can you see me at all?
– The Beatles

Nowhere Man, I see your lonesome cap over there.
You remember, the navy blue one
with “The Beatles” stitched on the front.
I pick it up with hands far too ordinary
to save your whirlwind spirit,
and after thirteen years, when I hold it to my face and inhale,
no lingering trace of your scent remains.
Instead, it only smells like cinnamon from the candle burning
beneath the vinyl albums hanging on the wall
like degrees displaying your expertise.
And I like cinnamon; it smells fine, but nothing like you:
Camel cigarettes, the woods, and White-Rain shampoo.

I remember your strawberry blonde hair peeking out of this hat
while you and Gran sat on her porch smoking.
She’d say it needed cut, but you would just laugh
at her feeble attempt to convince you to conform.
Nowhere Man, what a lovely, funny head you had, too
with your crooked smile and mischievous blue eyes
gleaming in front of a rock-n-roll brain
tormented by Desert Storm, lost love, and a stranger’s bullet.

Oh, Nowhere Man, does your blue-eyed spirit
lie next to me when my suitcase record player
plays Abbey Road, track one, side two?
Nowhere Man, what happened to you?
Nowhere Man, can you see me at all?