~
My lover has left, and everything is worse now
worse than the black hole that birthed me,
and then vacuumed the stars like dust,
the redshift that dims the eye, the coronagraph
with the moon of his mouth as its disk,
the payload door left open the entire flight,
the broken piece of cold metal
adhering without a scar;
worse than the duel at dawn with pistols drawn,
the arrow with its sturdy spine that pierces
the palm, the shattered shiny glass swept
into the dustpan, and washed down
the sink, the bite marks on the neck
after the struggle;
worse than the flourish of the ancient organ,
the dusty empty pews echoing silence,
some significance pinned to a wrinkled lapel
like a corsage, the sunrays rainbowing through
stained glass, the crucifix on the altar,
the baptismal fount with its algae, the genuflection
of the elder knee;
worse than the man who holds the door
open and shakes my hand, the small
kindnesses of strangers—smile, nod, wave;
worse than the chirp of hello
that guts me;
worse than the frigid waters of the deep,
the sagging yellow lifeboat filled
with microscopic holes.
I was prepared to drown. I was not
ready for the sudden realization
that I could swim, and swim very well,
and that we were drowning together
of our own freewill.
~
Cat Dixon is the author of Eva and Too Heavy to Carry (Stephen F. Austin University Press, 2016, 2014) and The Book of Levinson and Our End Has Brought the Spring (Finishing Line Press, 2017, 2015), and the chapbook, Table for Two (Poet’s Haven, 2019). Recent poems have appeared in Parentheses Journal, Lowecroft Chronicle, and SWWIM Every Day. Website: www.catdix.com.