Mark Levine

 

MARS

That was a long one. I’ll keep this one short. I’ll go one further. I’ll quicken this to a streaking crescent of side-swiping pain that will have barely happened. By the time you have lowered yourself into the scalding bath and been brazed by sudden knowing this will be done. Then what? Longing? Silence? What is silence? —Then comes the long hobble home with no tracking tool nothing but a regimen of tedious lifts and bends roll overs and hours spent face up examining the galloping shapes of clouds. Re-entry goes on long and slow stretching time to kill it. What were we doing here all along anyway supporting life? Surely there were other planets for us—be reasonable, there are—where we can take care of each other in some version of an instant then thankfully flame out.