Stomach

Scooped out. Heart and everything. An empty jug full of fruit flies. Purple, Sticky, stinking of yesterday. Glasses and bodies on the kitchen floor. A busted Los Lobos album. It’s over.

She disappeared in the bus and smoke and hang-over haze. She said, “Thank you.” She said, “Thank you for everything.” There is nothing left. Nothing but dirty dishes, This song in my head, This taste in my mouth, The smell of her on my sweater, A strand of hair. But these things only deepen the sting, enhancing her absence, intensifying my sorrow, raising this damn gloom so cornfield high.

You can’t go back to the summer in the middle of winter.

The weather man says there will be a war. The smoke clears, the corpses pile higher. People speak of retaliation and regret in the same breath. They’re up in arms about killing yet shaking their fists to kill. It is the age of drought and peak oil.

The breeze on the lake is good to kiss. The geese fly close together. The storm has passed. These butterfly petals all wet with rain. This ugly face all wet with tears. It’s no small thing.

© Carlo Zeno 2022