The Magic of Numbers
The Magic of Numbers’1
How strange it was to hear the furniture being moved around in the apartment upstairs!
I was twenty-six, and you were twenty-two.
The Magic of Numbers’2
You asked me if I wanted to run, but I said no and walked on.
I was nineteen, and you were seven.
The Magic of Numbers’3
Yes, but does X really like us?
We were both twenty-seven.
The Magic of Numbers’4
You look like Jerry Lewis (1950).
The Magic of Numbers’5
Grandfather and grandmother want you to go over to their house for dinner.
They were sixty-nine, and I was two and a half.
The Magic of Numbers’6
One day when I was twenty-nine years old I met you and nothing happened.
The Magic of Numbers’7
No, of course it wasn’t I who came to the library!
Brown eyes, flushed cheeks, brown hair. I was twenty-nine, and you were sixteen.
The Magic of Numbers’8
After we made love one night in Rockport I went outside and kissed the road
I felt so carried away. I was twenty-three, and you were nineteen.
The Magic of Numbers’9
I was twenty-nine, and so were you. We had a very passionate time.
Everything I read turned into a story about you and me, and everything I did was turned into a poem.
‘The Magic of Numbers’ from The Collected Poems of Kenneth Koch, published by Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. Copyright © 2006 by Kenneth Koch.
