love at the end of the world, part 2
there's a promise in the space
between your breath and mine;
an intimacy of mist, sheltered
from the fingers of wind and rain
there's a promise in the sidewalk cracks, oily
and 1 AMed, pebbled with slug trails
and smushed shots, the aching histories
which burlesque street lights into atmospheres,
light touches into galaxies, the wet spot in my hair
(water or bird shit?) into your eyes
against my cheek, the leaf there on your leg
into a terror of commitment like the cat
that stalks us with its unlucky hunger
you offer to shatter the windows
of a dead school,
half-rotten walnut tight in your
brown fingers;
when i laugh you
walk me home instead
and wait til i'm inside
without appearing to be waiting
scientists say that in thirteen years
the world will be broken beyond repair
but in this pregnant dark
the thought of your refusal
to break anything
is like a kite string
threading leaves
to where you're standing
underneath the stars
Nixi Schroeder is a writer and slam poet based out of Saint Louis Missouri. Her work has appeared in The Fem, The Sad Girl Review, Duck Lake, Blue Heron, Poetic Medicine, and other publications. When not writing, she teaches English.
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