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Alexis Pope's work has appeared or is forthcoming in Boxcar Poetry Review, Columbia Poetry Review, Anti-, and Sixth Finch, among others. She lives in Ohio where she co-curates The Big Big Mess Reading Series and is Contributing Editor for Whiskey Island Magazine.
Girl Erases Girl, Discovers Eternal Youth
On my front stoop you tell me that there has never
been another world like ours. This makes me happy
and sad. I think about all the planets with their emptiness
and how inhospitable they are to humans. I am happy
because I want us to be the only ones, but also
I want there to be more. Sometimes I wonder
why this apartment building stays put, like
what if gravity just decides to give up
and we’re sucked out of our beds and explode
into a million pajama’d pieces. When I die
there will be no more coffee, which will be okay
because I won’t have to wake up. That’s sad. Now
I’m sad. I think about how no one will ever touch me
again and I won’t be able to cry or how silly
it is to be frustrated because at any moment gravity
could call in sick. When I think about how long gravity
has been working the same job, I know how old
I am not. I’m so angry I went to college and the world
is going to end. And now my socks match
and it makes me want to scream.
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