Fallen

 

Cale Plett

 

You tell me time travel is easiest on clear nights
like this, hands colder than normal. It’s impossible
without fear. Maybe we walked away from Omelas 
to breathe our lives into the air and watch the stars
through ourselves. Cities of gold blur reflections and
flatten transparency and refraction. People pay to name
them, slivers of constellations. You claim your tears
are because history is written backwards, and when time
dares to reach out, we shouldn’t treat it like a party
favor. Then Lucifer jumped and heaven stole his story. 

On the screen, they fall backwards, hands grasping at
where they were. Promise you’ll stay. We are afraid to be
close to those we deem Godless because true loneliness
is having nothing to lose except yourself. Grace, looking
down from the rooftop of a skyscraper. You start singing
Forever Young, Alphaville, and I’m listening, bent around the
sound, Eve’s mouth around the apple. We learned this
creation story with all eyes waiting for her to sin. You and I
are entangled right now, no more breath in the air. It’s taken
a long time to learn that nothing hates us for our hunger.      

 

Cale Plett (he/they) is a nonbinary writer who lives in Winnipeg, where they are watching and listening for stories. Some they remember, some they forget, and some they turn into poetry, prose, and lyrics. Cale’s poetry and fiction are published in Grain, CV2, and The Anti-Languorous Project.