Some people’s names are not names,
but have come to denote
periods of history.

They tend to strike the ear
heavily, and reverberate through
the afternoon.

They preside inside of us
like books on oak shelves.
A perfect layer of dust
betrays their ill-studiedness:
ornaments.

Curious children have peeled off their labels,
then, the glue long dry, we left them off.

Cracking one open
reveals pages of full stops,

each marked a little too darkly
while absent-mindedly
waiting for the right sentence to attach.