two poems

by Joe Amato

To a Staircase

At the end of the hall

made by a sheetrock wall raised

within the old kitchen,

now the laundry room,

the first granite tread lay

fossilized like a snail’s shell

where ascent began

in this once rumored brothel,

my sophomore residence,

now budget hotel.

I held a fourth floor key,

but walked two flights

past trompe l’oeil marble

intarsia painted in the plaster

peach and verdigris,

blossoming ironwork,

hardwood banisters

patinated dark

by the touch of friends,

to this little landing, median

of memory and flesh:

one hand had fallen mid-

farewell—April,

nine years ago—

another caught and

held it,

holds it still.

At Heights

für Herzchen

The rosy twilight is almost gone,

but in the distant eggshell sunset

I hear your breath, your words resounding,

your answer to my question,

“What does it mean to think the Absolute?”

Will the rosé let me remember

how you answered Monday night, eye-to-eye,

œnotic fumes so strong they sting the memory . . .

To undo, refashion all that has been thought:

this is all or aught that it can mean

under the Chardonnay arc of the flight’s descent

as the lights dim lilac and all is dark—

I lean in to your neck like a familiar cat

to say, you, Herzchen, you are also an end

in itself, while we approach the ground:

your hometown, the earth the wheels hit, is here.

Photo of Joe Amato

BIO: Joe Amato is a writer and culture strategist based in San Francisco. His poetry has appeared in SPECTRA, Mantis, and Passage Prize Volume 1: Exit from the Longhouse. He received an inaugural Passage Prize for poetry in 2022.