If you’ll come out from behind the couch, 

I’ll pretend the missiles haven’t yet hit

and there’s still one more smile-fest, one 

to last longer than the end of things

 

took to arrive. Think of it. Even grad school

was never less than this. And all we have 

to do is learn to enjoy the descent, the way 

so many future worlds jet through 

 

the projector’s lens into bluer burns, nestle 

in your brain’s canyon. A set of cycloned stories 

we use to differentiate lives infuses us clear 

down to our tendril toes, sharpens the illusion 

 

of cars flowing down the street honking horns 

to vanish around the corner like roaches scatter 

when you turn on the florescent kitchen light. 

When the screen goes dark we go home, become

 

immense again, alone. Slip off our VR visors 

and swim all the way back into formless. Let go. 

Our photons, infinite, land on the retinal 

screens of deities not yet invented. Which is 

 

why this time, I’ve made you out of match heads, 

gasoline, a thick boa constrictor swallowing 

the planet very slowly, inch by grisly inch. 

Even though it’s only last Tuesday. We typically 

 

count our fingers to know we’re still dreaming 

by what we get. This is why every time I try 

making a movie of my life, the camera slips open  

and I forget to pull the cord, get off the bus.