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profile/james-laughlin.md
Published: Wed Apr 15 1992
Chitra Ganesh, How to Assemble a Flying Car (detail), 2018, linocut on tan BFK Rives. Courtesy of the artist & Durham Press.
In My Imagination

(though I am sixty now) I love
to finger you much as I did the

little girl who lived in the
house next door when I was ten

touching her was a matter of
fervent curiosity to find out

how she was different and to
speculate on what the differ-

ence meant_   _ but touching you
now (in my imagination) is

something else_     _it is an in-
visible act of pure affection

and my plea for reassurance I
want to be comforted by the

belief that you would want me
to love you if we were together.

See what's inside AGNI 35

James Laughlin is the founder of the New Directions Publishing House. His Collected Poems was published in 1994. (updated 6/2010)

Laughlin’s collection The Secret Room was reviewed in AGNI 46 by Drew Swinger.

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