and one day I get tired of walking
so I climb to the top of a very tall ridge
no bigger than the contours on your fingertips
and I jump

The ground spins away from me
and it falls into the distance
I get lost in orbit
around the technicolor island of shiny garbage we’ve all left in space
pincushioned with guidons
it spins out of my field of view

I scream at the stars
tell me why, tell me why
but they’re silent
they’ve always been silent

But even silence is an answer
and I’ve grown to know the voice of the void
without, within
the shape and color of that silence
has hardly ever stopped me from shouting
and somehow it never fails to surprise me when it shouts back

The self-portrait you printed on a rectangular piece of cloth
waving in the wind of the atmosphere of aerosolized liquids we've all sprayed
hairsprays and bug repellents
at the end of a metal pole
I see it
and even though I am too far away to do anything
I call out
and the answer comes in silence

And then it spins out of view
so I close my eyes

The tether of gravity hauls me back down
and I splash in the plastic ocean
the flecks of confetti that used to be styrofoam containers and disposable straws we've all used and disposed
dance in the light amid the baby blue

I sink
faster and faster as the bubbles rush out of my pores
the baby blue turns navy
the red and orange flecks blink out
and then the green
and the rest

The sun drifting farther and farther
even as I watch it go
then the blue goes too
and the cold of space is holding me again
I’m spinning out

The prehistoric things down there giving off their lights
make streaks of ultraviolet beyond my comprehension
they float around me
so alive and so alien
I watch them through my unblinking windows
undulating back and forth from one food source to the next
pushing against the silence down there
swimming stars in the night
they rotate out of my view and away
into the vacuum

And then the void takes me in
why, why I ask in the loudest whisper I can muster
water rushing over my vocal cords
and the answer comes

And I cannot see it
but I can feel the eventual dirt of the bottom rise up
to catch me
it consumes me like an amoeba taking in nutrients
I close my eyes
and I understand.