To: [email protected]

You were a flat pale tab in the sky

the night my world was upended.

.

I was going to pick up takeout, a routine

that felt absurd, barren, in light of everything,

crossing a familiar parking lot become surreal

in the premature dark. The night was clear, the stars

pinpricks so vivid I could bruise myself against them

and you were floating among them with

an unshakable serenity.

.

I knew you saw me then, in the moment

before the fire trucks came rushing past,

their sirens ripping through the silent October night.

.

You were always accessible in a way that

the sun, that golden idiot, was not.

I could look at you and not go blind for the crime.

In the days before my mother’s diagnosis, we did

just that, running out one night to take pictures of you,

orange and bloated, hanging so close over the frosted

lawn I thought I might touch you.

I rewrote this memory so my hand is in hers,

though I don't think it was at the time.

I used to think I had all the time in the world

for affection.

.

I used to think a lot of things.

.

When I rode in the car at night as a kid,

I used to think you were following me, peeking

out from behind the scudding clouds no matter

how many miles elapsed, seeming to skip

like a faithful dog across the dark.

.

The man on your surface is a collection of craters,

but I used to think it was some actual guy

wandering around up there, lost and loving it,

the opal glow of your skin like the brightest nightlight,

cupping him wherever he stepped, so no matter

where he went, he might as well already be

home.