You Have to Promise You Won’t Tell

People talk less in real life,
Less in both senses, less words
And less significant words.

It’s mostly repetitive
Small talk, little sentences
That need winnowing for weight.

When entered in evidence
As messages, recordings,
It’s obvious how talk works,

And watch the prosecutors
Feel for the hinge, the small thing
That carries the legal weight.

The rest is next to nothing,
And where the law’s not involved,
Even less. Still we converse

In our mealy-mouthed, mostly
Polite, inconsequential
Way, low-key interactions

That somehow are related
To the dense, febrile friction
Of talk found in our fictions.