They close our job. We stumble to the train.
Above us claims nothing but birds. The planes 
are all grounded. Yowling coyotes hunt
beyond the edge of the streetlights. For months, 
not a single school shooting, though the earth 
demands its always of blood—even now
I know friends are dying. I sneak to her 
after curfew, criminal, heart swollen 
and ripe. In her backyard, light paints her 
body pale against the grass, shadows press 
into her belly. It's impossible 
to keep track of everything that’s gone wrong.  
But beneath her ribs I rest my head 
on a pillow made of the moon. 
A million people die. It’s just the two 
of us at her house. Our fingers catch
on the ridges of our prints, the pressure 
of when to push, when to pull together, 
our bodies moving toward the grace of us. 
We come together. Always and again,
watermelon split open, pink and spilling 
a sunrise of sugar. A coyote 
walks down the middle of State Street. And then
it ends. And begins. Planes fly, work reopens. 
The shootings resume. We no longer speak.