The Pitchman’s Sorrow Pitch

Ama Codjoe

Humans and androids, sons of Wheatley and daughters of Jupiter,

I am the nobody that knows trouble seen. Some may call this

blasphemy. I believe all joy comes from a sorrow

passed down like a chainless pocket watch. There’s a variety

of figs that grows along the vines of countless public walls. Lush

and purple, the figs appear delectable. They are hard

to break apart. They are plentiful and inedible.

The old man treading water in a cold sea adds to this tale

of sorrow. I’ve cried as I watched the first light

bloom on my sleeping lover’s face. A single joy slid

down my cheek, disappearing into the pillow. I knew a joy,

I knew a joy briny and private and full of time.

I’m tired of the extraordinary. I know, given all my talk, this must

sound like baloney, but I’m as wearied by the grotesque

as I am by the strikingly beautiful. I believe in the ordinary,

which is either a life of sorrow with flashes of joy or a life

of joy with crashes of sorrow. I prefer washing dishes

to folding laundry. My days run together, like the teardrop

falling into the pillow, like how I like my eggs. I know

how to tell a lie convincingly. The truth is, poetry is a lie

resembling a truth. Hallelujah. I’ve seen it all. Look long enough

and anything becomes a still life—plain and decaying, just like

you and me. I set my watch to the time it takes

to move from astonishment to apathy. Look, there’s a blue

whale breaching. Come quick, the sun is diving into the sea.