The absence of chat bothers me
every winter. If one word can get away
like that, I begin doubting everything.
I was trying to get to the library in Fayetteville,
grinding chat under my feet up Dickson street
(trying to get to the real library, not the bar
by the same name), and that was definitely
chat heaped against the snowbank.
Small particles disappear, then it’s easy
to slip, an armload of books skidding
halfway down the block. I remember
the block where I knew all the names: Bauder,
Glenn, Adams, Craig, Stevens. I know
these were right, before they died. Now
all the rooms have been redecorated.
I wonder if I’m okay. I get the entire
Arkansas Highway Department fixed in my mind,
the men finishing their cigarettes, saying,
“Load up that chat, we’re spreading chat
today.” Chat is poured into trucks.
The men have no idea of the circumference
of their world. They think it goes on forever.
I say chat to the people I know here.
They’ve never heard of it. Things in my past
might not have happened. My first husband
laid his hard hat on the table. I’m not
sure if I was there. I look up gravel
in the dictionary. I look up chat, which is
only a verb. I feel a little guilty,
filling in where nothing exists. When my
father is talking, I still have to work hard
to get a word in and make it stick.
When my mother is talking,
I have to find a word, put it in her mouth
and let it rattle around so she can make a sound.
I am almost crying, trying to get her to say
anything. I describe the absence the best
I can. A man and a woman are on opposite sides
of the street, calling across. They have had a life
I don’t know, I can’t even hear them, in my car.
Two trucks in front of me are full of chat.
I take it as a sign I should write this.