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a poem for the end of the world (edit)
a poem for the end of the world
Sand for skin, her hand scratches along
the spine. Lips rubbed together erode
words necessary to maintain belief.
Tears cut canyons into desert heart,
numb intention, build pyres of regret,
send splintered ships into rivers. She bled
for him; they went shopping arm in arm
down bruised aisles. She bought a Ferrari
made from the hair of dead Warsaw children,
he built a house from the flesh
of Uganda’s women, they fucked the night,
lit up the next day; sold souls on the corner
to passers-by who dropped eyes of honest men
into their palms; tasted olives dipped in sin.
In their late teens they stopped talking, gazed
at the pink sky, took pot shots at shepherds
of the flock of fleeing feet. Earthquakes
for breakfast at Tiffany’s, caviar and iced kidneys
for lunch. In the evening they sat together
on the shore. Watched waves of naked breasts
bob beneath rich man’s wares. It ended too
soon - they were glad when it finally arrived.
Pulled the curtains, switched off the lights,
drank themselves senseless, felt the grease
crackle from their fish and chips hearts;
promised to meet in Old Orleans, sing
old songs, smother themselves
in the sucking, wet clay of unforgiving sex.
Sticky pools coagulate on the sheets
of sustenance, they missed the mark,
it seems, but oh the wonders of existence
were never meant for ones such as these.
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