The Maynard
Spring 2018

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Watching Netflix

We sat last night on the sofa watching
Messiah, wondering whether Mehdi Dehbi, the actor
in the title role, is playing it real or slant. He has
the long black hair, the past-and-future face, a
backlit glow, the yellow robe and multitudes
attending. A sudden sandstorm sweeps the foe—
as if by superhuman hand. Is it his or God’s

and does he believe it? The part of us
that’s soft and sinking
into the sofa’s dip, lends us
for the story, to suspend

our disbelief. The hero tells his foil—
the wide-eyed agent who plays for the CIA—
things about herself she thinks he could
only know from intel.

Say what you will there’s something happening—
radio bursts plink extra-galactic
war drones infrasonic memes and oceans rising
holographic waves I’m thinking from the sofa

that the thermostat is set too low, and neither of us
feels like rising to raise it. When the episode ends,
we let the TV load the next one, even though we’re freezing,
and dinner has congealed in grease on our plates.
Suddenly your hand slips through my skin like spider silk.
                                         Fine, light, diaphanous,
                                                    already gone—
as if I’ve interrupted a snowball’s chance.