Graphic by Dom Talbot
(here is a link to the video featured in the poem)
Whenever I am feeling down, I watch this edit I initially found lazily scrolling online.
I had clicked on the video tepidly, at first, unmuting with only mild interest, but soon I found myself hungrily saving it to my laptop after a single screening.
The file is labeled: “out of touch.mp4.”
The video itself is a compilation of romantic clips of Spock and Kirk from Star Trek: The Original Series, skillfully played over “Out of Touch” by Daryll Hall & John Oates. My discovery of the video felt spiritual, a mantra going:
You’re out of touch.
I’m out of time.
But I’m out of my head when you’re not around.
I cannot help instinctively swinging my arms to the song—losing myself in the motion and beat. I pulse my body to the rhythm, sway to the stars, choose a thrilling vulnerability for this brief ritual.
Out of touch.
Out of time.
Out of my head when you’re not around.
The video is less than a minute, 51 seconds scrapbooking Spock into a loving sci-fi fancam. The moments his dry voice breaks the music are the best, like the counting before the rocket, the thunder before the storm.
Touch.
Time.
My head, not around.
How can you mourn what you struggle to remember?
You’re out
I’m
Out head you’re not around.
I click on memories of you in my mind, I replay them and beg for a familiar narrative— a relationship that used to follow a beat.
You’re touch
Out
Out of my around.
I cut my bangs as Spock did. My hair gives space to sharp brows, they don’t get in my eyes when I frown. They don’t get in my eyes when I cry.
Of touch
Of time
My not around.
Similarly to Captain Kirk, you as I know you does not exist. You are more unreal than an unfeeling alien with psychic powers. A William Shatner is more fitting for your figure,
but that’s not what I play when I’m sad.
You’re
I’m
Head when around.
.
You’re out
I’m
Not around.
.
Out of
Time
But my head not.
.
You’re touch
Of time
When.
.
I’m of
Head not around.
.
Out
Out
Out.