Twitter

A poem + some thoughts

Twitter

I love Twitter
I’m on it all the time
I don’t know if you’re a Twitter person, but
You need to get on Twitter
You need to sell yourself on Twitter
You need to find yourself on Twitter
You need to build your house on Twitter

I went on Twitter
to see who P was
because after 6 and a half years together,
the person I knew was no longer there.

And what I found, was another life
full of writing
and readings
and selfies
and new clothes
and another dog
and another woman
and one of those engagement announcements
that you see
where someone’s friend who you don’t know
was hiding in the bushes
waiting
to take a photo of the happy couple.
And, all the comments of strangers who care
enough to send a heart
and congrats.

And these images may never leave me:
the two of them side-by-side posing
with their arms around each other in the way you put 
your arm around 
your cousin you never see or a co-worker or someone else you kind of know, who now you have to touch because someone said: everyone get together for a photo.

And then, the photo of a person I knew named P, with the same wild dark curls I used to run my fingers through, stroke while they rested their head on my chest—the intimacy of this memory pressing against their hand in the photo, a lifted hand, palm in and ring out, a ring I’d never buy them, a ring for someone not them, but a ring for them anyway.

In this other world
at this other time
at the same time
in this same world
where I sit in my apartment in Brooklyn,
2 hours away from them in Philadelphia
and contemplate
the look in their eyes (scared/nervous/loved?)
and the hand that used to reach for mine,

and how
I will find the words to
end
us.

Written in 2019.

This poem/memoir/cross-genre whatever-it-is-piece is the opening of part IV of my memoir. The weird—yes, weird—opening lines in italics came from a talk I saw at NYU when I went to a writing workshop there the summer I wrote this. Some person talking about how to market yourself as a writer, and I remember feeling so befuddled and grossed-out by what she was saying. I have never marketed myself despite, ironically, having a career in marketing, and am generally so private that I avoid social media aside from my vague “tumblr girl’ style instagram (Tumblr really was my era, sigh). I’ve been thinking about all this, and this poem in particular, because I didn’t know what Substack was until my fiancé made his and I thought it was mostly a place to share writing and build community (things I should do more of), though sometimes it can feel like it is barreling toward Twitter territory which gives me pause. As does sharing much of myself—I am already getting used to being the fiancé of a public figure after all (and by the way, totally worth it, he’s the greatest thing to happen to me).

This piece is a turning point in my memoir, opening the last section, and given the subject matter, was clearly a devastating and surreal turning point in my life, making social media an even more inhospitable environment for me.

Despite hating the talk that person gave at NYU—the oddness of it, the worship of Twitter in each and every phrase—it allowed me the entry into this piece (the events of which had just occurred probably 6 weeks before), something that felt nearly impossible. By entering though this idea (that many people believe, especially at that time) of Twitter being this place full of possibility and answers to life’s questions, the bucket of gold for your career, a place so beautiful you should build a home within its walls, I was able to drop into the depths of what the reality was (is).

Idk, felt relevant. And of my older work, this is still one I’m quite proud of.