Justin Evans

Nothing

Let’s be clear. Finding the God particle
doesn’t mean you have found God
and it certainly doesn’t mean you can
finally unravel quantum entanglement
as it applies to what makes one sitcom
succeed where others have failed.
For the better part of a year now, we have
known nothing is not a thing, that everywhere
you look there is something. Even in a vacuum
some semblance of something exists. This
is also why we need to abolish philosophers
from our schools and public forums. When
they argue that in naming nothing it becomes
a thing, and thereby brings into existence
nothing, they are way past counting
how many angels can dance on the head
of a pin. Fuck ontology. I pull that thread
every time I get stoned. So do you. So do
we all. What is left is a remainder. After
every moment something remains, and if
something remains like ash after a fire, then
you can bet your last superposition dollar
that there is always something. We cannot
walk through this universe alone and neither
can anything else, and that includes nothing.

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Justin Evans was born and raised in Utah. He served in the army and then graduated from Southern Utah University and later the University of Nevada, Reno. He lives in rural Nevada with his wife and sons, where he teaches at the local high school. Justin’s seventh full-length book of poetry, Cenotaph, is being released in March of 2024 from Kelsay Books. He has poems forthcoming from The Meadow, and Weber: The Contemporary West. Justin has twice received Artist Fellowship Grants from the State of Nevada.