I’m sitting in a lawn chair At the edge of the moon’s well cratered chest I’m facing a woman whose company is pricy and measured by rounded hours She sits full lotus Supple legs twist in a curving swirl Seated on the glass surface of the coffee table Young and slight enough to have no rational fear of it shattering beneath her
I ask to ask her something She simpers Anything So I begin my slurred inquiry If there was a God And And it told you that Today was the day you would die But it would spare you and let you live on well Well Into old age if you could give a good reason why It should let you live then What would your reason be I belch a pig’s roar What would your reason be
She simpers again Ooooh **** that’s a good question She toys with the starched mass of her hair Flailing to be remembered by me and gain another loyal customer
I guess I guess I’d say that I had a daughter and Do You have a daughter She’s nineteen at the oldest Yesss I do I blink What’s her name Her name is Nelly So So you’d say you had a daughter and And that she needs me She loves me I love her I can’t leave her alone
In the center of the dark and lashed ellipses that halo her hazel eyes I’m finally seeing a woman
She tilts her face Her bangs silk to her jawbone What would your reason be
I unscrew my flask
I wouldn’t give one I deserve to die However Luckily for me This life is unfair and unjust In reality You can plead to God all you want but even if it hears you It won’t stop what it’s already made And what it’s made is death
We’re both still facing each other But we’re not looking at each other anymore We’re both staring at space’s unfathomable darkness The all consuming black
I know from where she is She can see the Earth She can see the spins of white puff The emerald and umber chunks The deep sapphire that coats the planet’s skin Maybe she’s thinking of Nelly
From where I sit All I can see are the tiny scabs of distant stars Moth bites In an all swallowing cloak
I check my watch My current bill is approximately 1,600USD I hear her voice For the first time today Her voice is genuine and entirely naked Are you saying that God doesn’t save anyone
The weight of the knife in my pocket Feels heavier than it should be Especially here The craters of the moon are yawning wide They’ve always made perfect graves
I drink the last gulp of bourbon from my flask
Before I answer her I wonder if her question is also asked by the others The high piled and shallow buried Crisscrossing one another Overlapped like piles of pottery pieces Or shards of shale They lie Trapped on the sun’s mirror Lifelessly embracing and lying upon each other Coincidently kissing each others wounds Stuffed in the stony rings of the craters of the graying moon
Some I left floating in lakes Both here And back on Earth
Are they all wordlessly asking each other Screaming through sunken faces Won’t God save us Doesn’t God save anyone
I toss my flask to the side It takes forever to fall
Well Charlotte As far as I’m concerned He hasn’t saved anyone yet