Prehistory

by Sarah Burke

The days are so full their seams burst Sucked
to the edges even the traffic cones are inverted
down into the mud So many rocketships
buzz I can barely hear the sun I can barely
hear the puddles Everything feels so European
Everything feels so 1970s I throw a brick at
the sun and the sun shouts a little heart at me
which is so 1920s Every rocket and every
star has an angel They sing a song in Marxist
symbol language They are Byzantine colored
Everything goes somewhere That
“holy, glowing heart� pole-dances
down the God-axis and lands in my lap
thumping like a baby The tonsured scholars
walk by whispering about their scholar-
shaped God who has as many angles as a triangle
tied in a knot The rockets send reports about
fuel crises on other planets They cover
plagues from their airtight wonder-boxes
Angels, flickering, wipe sweat from our brows
and put so many little presents, so many gemstones +
kittens + shells + matchbooks, at our feet
We almost notice All this now feels like
prehistory I can almost read the future in the curtain
of water the truck erects and destroys, oblivious,
as it passes