"Come Back Mister Scissorhands"

I occasionlly read The Best American Poetry blog, which is written by a series of weekly guest bloggers. This week, the guest blogger is Elena Karina Byrne, and today, she introduced her readers to Lynne Thompson's "Come Back Mister Scissorhands."

I really enjoyed this poem. It's weird, it's jumpy, it's associative, but I love how she does not drown in the mystery and tangentiality in this poem; she chooses a subject (a man from a dream) and lets his names whirl across his blank face like clouds across the sky. The result is a poem that is strange but clear, even though its clarity rises from gut instinct, not from logic.

I believe that this poem first appeared in Thompson's first collection of poetry Beg No Pardon, published by Perugia Press in 2007.

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Come Back Mister Scissorhands

By Lynne Thompson

In my dreams, his name is Hunger Unspoken. His name

is House Still Sleeping, is Cigarette, Wolf, and Cold Coffee.

Under my lids, his name cascades like snow,

slips away like black jade, one minute paraìso

then suddenly cara-de-cão or ninho des vespas

and I am as old as I am. In my useless reveries,

I speak more softly than the dying

when I call to him: night horn? root of a scream?