Eco-Conscious Aubade with Starshine
I should explain: cosmic rays
might be responsible
for the 2009 Toyota recall.
In a word, supernovae
expel particles that could
have interfered with these vehicles’
circuits, causing sudden,
uncontrollable acceleration.
I’ll tell it to you straight:
stars were murdering eco-conscious,
hybrid-driving human beings.
Enter sun
through linen curtains and I thought
I would love, despite
any number of abstractions
that keep me out of the body,
keep fingers dripping
with antibacterial soaps.
I thought
today would be the day to respond
in kind to joy
like that joy my nephews bring
into the morning—
my nephews
with frogs on their heads,
who dive for torpedoes in the pool—
but only before we saw Earth’s
last great beasts
trained to splash spectators
in the front rows,
before disgruntled families
in the arena
bemoaned their orca-soaked cell phones
despite
what were obvious fair warnings,
before I waited to join edgewise
your conversation
and when I finally spoke,
you left the room. Listen:
the remote-controlled fan’s
high-pitched hum
that early at dawn
was already competing with the quiet moan
of commuters and stars
were dead and set
on taking us fuckers down.
Zach Linge (pronouns they/them) is the Editor-in-Chief of The Southeast Review and a PhD student in Poetry at Florida State University. Linge’s publications include poems in Poetry Magazine, The Journal, Queen Mob’s Teahouse, and Sonora Review, and a refereed article on Percival Everett in African American Review, vol. 52, no. 1, among others.