what the sky looks like right now – justin karcher

Sometimes I pretend the sky & clouds
are just pieces of really expensive paper

shooting stars are just really beautiful papercuts

when you’re young
you stare at the sky & write with your eyes
imagination is just a really nice optometrist
who encourages your vision even if it misses the mark

as you get older
you stare at the sky & write with your fists
it’s a little more violent

you dream of rocket ships exploding in earth’s atmosphere
jet lag confetti raining down on rooftop parties
where evil men drink hallucinogenic bourbon
out of the skulls of orphan babies

you dream of planes crashing into gated communities
where the rich never leave their mansions
spending most of their time
ripping out pages from chapbooks
written by overworked poets
always on the verge of suicide
making paper airplanes out of the trauma
throwing them into fireplaces

when you’re old
you don’t even look at the sky
every room in your home
in your heart
in your brain
has become a basement
full of wet boxes
caused by leaky pipes
you don’t bother to repair

all the suicide notes & love letters
you’ve penned over the years
disintegrating into mush
the words that meant so much
running into one another
like when cops break up a party
the words left behind
form new sentences
you must dig out of the drowning
then you must read what you sew:

there are no windows in your life anymore
all the lovebirds stuffed into a drawer

tenderness is a thousand dolls taking your breath away
a thousand cats pulling your ribcage like a sleigh

the death you deserve, fireflies sinking to the bottom of an ashtray
you’ve always been an origami car stranded on the highway

and the sun is always setting somewhere else
you just wanted a hotter melt