A room full of aliens
I feel too warm
They are staring
I swallow dry
Walk up
“Hello. I’m Katie.”
They don’t eat me
I feel better

What should go at the top?
This is agonizing;
I need a sum,
Quick but brilliant,
Of what lies inside.
Oh, look,
It's perfect now,
but I've left out
the insides.

“d’ya see it yet?”
“no, no, swing harder!”
Tink tink TINK TINK
“A hole! Hit there!”
SLAM! Crumbling
Falling through
Landing soft on
Nothing
“Her head-”
“There’s nothing in here!”
Skeptic now
Of their own minds
“there should be
An entire world in here!”
Banging at their skulls
“is that how ours are?”
Picks through their own bones
They look into empty worlds
“anything in mine?”
“nothing!”
“yours, too!”
Climbing from the shell
Cracking others open
“there must be
A thought in one of them
For us to live on”
Splitting into white
Finding only white
Staring in dismay
At all the wasted gateways

Fingers reaching out
Getting close, brushing the sun
So warm, then they melt