But I wonder if perhaps we should
Walk a hundred miles on our knees
Through the desert. Repenting.
For the world that does not go on.
Clear rain, deep trees, clean blue air —
I don't know what such language means,
For these are not now simple things.
That world has gone.
Chemistry will be eternal,
Stars will burn, this planet morph
Maybe to red dust, there will be
Black holes and supernovae;
But here, now, our poor soft animal bodies
When we love, find perhaps, sometimes,
Some comfort, but also pain —
We might look up
And see only one goose flying —
True, the truest thing, trusting, for now,
But seeking in an empty sky.
Alix Greenwood is a lesbian living in Oakland, California. Her poems have appeared in Lavender Review, Rain and Thunder, Sinister Wisdom, and Three Line Poetry.
