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center for writing | minnesota writing project | mwp invitational summer institute | institute fellows 2015

Linda O'Malley

©2015

readingTwo or Three

Kurt Vonnegut writes “All this happened, more or less”
leaving us to imagine
events filling the more side
and those weighing down the less space.
That continuum of truth to falsehood
concrete candor to distant dreams,
hard to draw a dividing line
between the two.
Love or Lust?
Black or White?
Left or Right?
All this happens . . . more or less.
We claim our spots on paths
between nodes
hoping to find the apex
that tipping point of beliefs and inner truths.
But when a question is asked
about a number, a concrete number
are there two in your family, or three,
Is it right to hedge, to find balance
somewhere in the middle?
Two or three of you, he asks
I pause, scanning for the polar ends.
More or less, I answer.