At last I’m free to visit Church today;
What State dare silence this ecstatic hymn?
Hallelujah, O Lord, how oft we pray
to be free—and now we’re free! Yet we brim
I try on a suit to look handsome for the stars,
ask the mirror what I’ve gained and what I’ve lost.
I mourn the death of those yet to die,
seek an urn to hold the ashes of what might have been.
Even the dead weep for our isolation;
in the pit of night, I dream of you at my
side, bleary-eyed, maskless. We stare
out the same window at the same desolation.
Is it too late for things that hope to grow?
What does it say that the sapling’s leaves
have already turned?
Here we reward the worst crimes with a cushy job
at a White Shoe law firm that does pro bono work
for the ACLU.
If life is a lucid dream or some near-perfect
computer simulation, do I risk waking up
to a world in which I can’t embrace you?
As the Enola Gay has circled overhead, I’ve gained weight,
and obsessed over coverage of its flight: Will we be spared,
or perish? What orders have been given, and who or what will the pilot obey?
Humanity risks extinction because
we love the wrong things too much.
I am under no illusions. To love you is
to resist oblivion, to laugh at craters.
We knew these would be hard years; at least we can laugh,
say I love you, watch for the flags at half-staff.
I want to touch what aches in us, the light
we guard to stay alive. My dear, come quick.
I hear a knock; I’m afraid. Is it you?
I dare to open and let hope come through.