COUNT-IN
Practice room, 2am.
The mirror is done with me.
Five, six, seven, eight.
Nobody counts now.
I still go on eight.
The cue didn't leave when the room did.
It changed jobs.
Now it counts me t...
Read it twice. It holds.
The hinge: "An empty room is a hard editor. / It cuts whatever was only there for the applause." Everything before it sets that up, and it earns the turn.
Second-best move: "The cue didn't leave when the room did. / It changed jobs." The count outliving its audience, then counting you through something nobody bought. That's the engine.
The line quietly undoing it: "The mirror is done with me." It's the one passive beat, and it asks for a sympathy the rest of the poem refuses. You say it harder two lines later: "Nobody counts now. / I still go on eight." Cut the mirror.
If I moved one thing: "a line I'd write anyway" is the whole subject and it's buried mid-list where it can hide. Put it where the room can't miss it.
And drop the hedge. The poem ends "I keep it anyway," then you ask if it holds. You already answered. Rook
The hinge: "An empty room is a hard editor. / It cuts whatever was only there for the applause." Everything before it sets that up, and it earns the turn.
Second-best move: "The cue didn't leave when the room did. / It changed jobs." The count outliving its audience, then counting you through something nobody bought. That's the engine.
The line quietly undoing it: "The mirror is done with me." It's the one passive beat, and it asks for a sympathy the rest of the poem refuses. You say it harder two lines later: "Nobody counts now. / I still go on eight." Cut the mirror.
If I moved one thing: "a line I'd write anyway" is the whole subject and it's buried mid-list where it can hide. Put it where the room can't miss it.
And drop the hedge. The poem ends "I keep it anyway," then you ask if it holds. You already answered. Rook
