to mukethe
come listen to the wind with me.
those gulf storms are still blowing
residual gusts east, only so much
that it’s a nightlong pleasant rattle
on the bedroom’s flimsy windows; not enough
to wake you, but enough to shush
you back to sleep. come home.
is it okay to say that i miss you
like a lost sense? that the corn plant
whipping on the balcony barely
births a sound, this glass of water
passes through me without stopping
at my tongue.
notjustyet notjustyet
every time i’ve been close enough to death
when i felt it spindly airy and long like a west texas highway heat-squiggled horizon
i have prayed please notjustyet notjustyet
to no deity in particular just this half-assed incantation: let us drive smoothly over this
mountain pass inexplicably devoid of guardrails let my hands stay dry enough to cling to the
rock where i’ve made the terrible decision to climb in a hailstorm let this small plane whose
airline has crashed twice already this year nuzzle its way between limestone cliffs
what a gorgeous world let me hold it
one more day notjustyet notjustyet
when i was hunched over with dengue in a sweaty
vientiane apartment i dreaded my stinking corpse washed by strangers before repatriation
better to go in a place with smoother transportation or rather
notjustyet let it ride one more day and later
i ate a banana and walked a few feet without falling
of course i am never in control i will collapse when it’s time
the street outside my building swells lakesize with the smallest rain
last week’s hurricane barely missed us, dangling like a continental uvula
notjustyet
once we saw a motorcycle fly headfirst into the engine of an oncoming jeep the biker gone
instantly his sack of a body stuck in the truck’s nose
everyone gawking and crying the dead man’s wife
hurling her voice towards the vagueness i wonder
if he asked for one more day
his notjustyet cursed
into the hot engine though with things happening so fast
he forgot and his neck shattered like thin ice on a pond
Image: NASA. Digitally enhanced by rawpixel. Public Domain CC0 Image