Time Machine
By Elizabeth Hayes
It is 2026.
I hit the knob on the radio,
my other hand
white knuckling the steering wheel.
Humanity builds the first carriage,
and a year later,
or maybe a day,
or perhaps a decade,
a song is sung, or hummed, or belted,
while one’s hands
grip the reins like a lifeline.
I change the channel,
and centuries prior,
a lover debates
telling their other half
to pick another song,
before swallowing the words whole,
and history forgets it.
I am twelve,
in a Guitar Center with my family,
bored out of my mind.
I pick up a drumstick,
and ages ago, the first drum is born,
the only symmetry between our tunes,
being that no one,
will remember the sound.
But in my heart, I recall, the elation
of music made
from something other than a bird’s throat.