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Poetry

Nothing

by Oliver Leech

You don’t find it by chance under a cushion,
or in the shed beside some bicycle clips.
You can’t reveal it
by subtracting all the somethings one by one,
or by shrinking them smaller and smaller,
or dissecting them into nano-sized chunks
and then some,
or by turning down the volume to its lowest,
by blocking out the light;
by slicing, syphoning off, peeling away, scraping,
sliver by tiny sliver.
None of that works.
We’ve not seen it, heard it, touched it.
But there between plus and minus,
between the debit and the credit
we recognise it:
somehow we know nothing.

Oliver Leech explores philosophy, poetry, art and calligraphy. See his website: oliverleechwork.com.