Past Tense, Future Imperfect
May 12 2009


Mistakes were made.

In the passive voice.
In the virtual notes
of diminished chords and overtones.
In subjunctive
imperfect
the simple past.

If deterrence really worked
they could put us all away,
no appeal.
But these three words
defer the blame
make it sound like fate,
and we were helpless.
The subject
conjured out of ether.
The object
unspecified.
The victim
only vaguely implied.

There are mistakes, errors, and crimes.
There are misdemeanours
and lies,
of commission, omission
from black to white.
And mistakes that go unrecognized
but fester;
to the ends of our lives,
our children’s children.

We will be at it the rest of the night,
rain drumming
wind singing,
leaves flapping wetly
like wild applause.
And eavesdropping trees
that groan and creak,
leaning hard before the storm.

Confession is good for the soul,
but you must own it all.
And there is no confessing alone —
both of us
talking, listening
taking turns,
letting-go
our burden.



The passive voice always seems like a cop-out to me, like a weasly quisling sort of pawning-off of responsibility. So when I read this sentence -- "Mistakes were made" -- I couldn't resist playing around with it.

There is something very Bush and Nixon about this expression! "Mistakes were made" has this sense of relegating everything to some remote past, one with no connection to the speaker. And it has this sense of some vague nebulous subject, some unaccountable actor who isn't really that strongly attached to the conveniently conjugated verb "were made".

What I particularly like is that I finished it in exactly the opposite fashion: the liberal use of "you" and "us" and "our", in stark contrast to the unaccountable sentence that begins it. In the end, it becomes a couple, and they are taking ownership. There is nothing specific here: no narrative of wrongs and reprisals and thoughtless acts. I think most readers are more than capable of projecting themselves into this, and can probably come up with a lot more -- and a lot worse -- transgressions that I could ever pen.

I also like the pathetic fallacy in the second last stanza: the stormy night, the leaves applauding, the trees listening-in.

By the way, the "virtual notes" in the first stanza are supposed to imply the "third voice" of a duo, or the so-called "fifth voice" of a barbershop quartet: it's that virtual voice that is magically produced when people sing in perfect harmony. So in that sense, there is -- like the passive voice -- a smugly self-satisfied sound, but no one is really accountable, no one is taking ownership. (It also foreshadows the conclusion: you can't produce that virtual voice without harmony and communication, the same kind of harmony and communication needed when two people are talking and attempting to reconcile.)