In the Third Sleep, We Will Converge. After the Next Revolution, We Will Stop Screaming.

by Jade Wallace  

(for Kay Sage, who went quiet on January 8, 1963)

 

Like echoes we are 

 

 

alone in the desert.  

 

 

Oracles look at our landscape

 

 

and see how we will die.  

 

You in your pillbox, 

 

curtains drawn;

me in mine, 

 

watching the radio antenna 

shudder your voice 

over barren air.

 

Copper circuits our days,

a corn snake vibrating 

between us. Our days are 

dunes we have been thrust upon.

 

Ozymandias looms, Colossus leers, 

and like ants we are invisible 

in shadow, waiting for night 

to lower the shades 

of cypress. 

 

Nothing lasts, you say;

Nothing lasts, I agree.  

We watch for birds rising 

unruly against the sky—

the infinitesimal feather 

that will break our horizon.