Until then let the sun in his smug brilliance kiss our honey drenched lips
Our arms dangling, our legs splayed out or wound together tightly
Our rampages and our silence. Our prayers scattered
To the wind or repeated over and over in the mirror
Until they lose all magic. Let us wear crucifixes ‘round our necks
And use them to break our backs and pin our guilt
And nail our morality into. Let us have superstition
And thawed ground under slate grey sky. Frost bitten fingers and toes
To count our blessings and rub our relics, our rosaries between. Our strength no
Mightier than a drunken bumblebee’s. Let us have meaning
And a crusade. A prophet dead with more volumes to write.
Nothing to dance for us other than a plastic bag in the wind.
If none of this will be immortalized, then let us keep creating
With hands more worn than
A beggar’s winter coat. For this is existence. To take
Up threads and intertwine them for meaning
And when they are worn down to nothing
To keep weaving regardless. For this is our sanity.
Let us forget our sanity. For this is existence.
Let us forget our existence. Our ribcage
Where empty promises stick and snare us. Our lungs
That exhale phrases that leave another breathless.
And what if this is oblivion?
Our saints and confessions? Our sunk Lusitania?
Then let it. Let it coil around us and pull us under
And make us forget we are made of ashes and dust,
That there is meaning in the touch of a shoulder or caress of the waist.
Morgan LaRocca is a sophomore at Towson University and is pursuing a major in English with a concentration in writing. She is an active member in her campus community, serving as the honors college student director as well as writing center tutor. In her free time she enjoys hiking and travelling. She has been published once before in Sequel Literary Magazine.