Our Love Is Nothing Like an Apocalypse

Our Love Is Nothing Like an Apocalypse

the miracle

I am so grateful each morning
that we have not yet eviscerated each other
completely.
it sticks in my teeth (the
being alive / the not dying).

maybe the sky will fall eventually,
but today: fervent ripeness,
this day another thing to taste the
sweetness of.

I hold my own hand. call it the
response to a suicide note, call it the
process of elimination. whatever.
it is still soft & sure.

tell me: if I stretched out this love
do you think it might cover us both?
I do. an orchard breath-ed morning
swelling around us.
nothing like an apocalypse.

the optimism will not hold

so I change my name to the middle of July.
all long days and stifling nights.

now, my heart does not threaten to
break free from my chest.

now, every startling noise is a celebration,
every head that turns to see has a smile.

I clear my throat and even the silence leans in.

everything good has a tangible likelihood;
especially living into tomorrow.

now, my mouth is both gun & firework;
I am struggling to let the right one speak.

listen; there’s singing from somewhere,
but I don’t think it’s me.

now, my face is a clock always striking
midnight; my throat opens only to close.

I am told to ask for what I want; instead I
bleed out into a stranger’s flower bed,
break a stained glass window
that might’ve been mine.

now, there’s nothing here that couldn't
be a grave given time.