Incident by Norman MacCaig

Norman MacCaig

Incident by Norman MacCaig

T.

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Someone once asked me to do something impossible, and with all my heart, I did.

Incident

Norman MacCaig

I look across the table and think

(fiery with love)

Ask me, go on, ask me

to do something impossible,

something freakishly useless,

something unimaginable and inimitable

Like making a finger break into blossom

or walking for half an hour in twenty minutes

or remembering tomorrow.

I will you to ask it.

But all you say is

Will you give me a cigarette?

And I smile and,

returning to the marvelous world

of possibility

I give you one

with a hand that trembles

with a human trembling.

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