She must have really loved him. Kentucky girl,
settling on the banks of Troublesome Creek
with a French orphan. Long before
roads, before the mines
would bring in trains, she is miles from Hardshell
or Dwarf or Fisty with a man whose skin
is as blue as the summer berries. Eventually, scientists
will discover one of the rarest objects
in the galaxy, the product of two sun remnants
merging and reigniting themselves. In the meantime, what to do
when grandfather is French and blue
and the girl next door is your cousin? You kiss her
in a misty glade illuminated
by lightening bugs, you marry her in the strung debris fields
of two collapsed stars and then you hide, a rogue
creation, because you give off the wrong light. But time
is on the side of everything in the cosmos
and big ol’ nurse Pendergrass will find you
when she sees to Aunt Luna, lips
as dark as a bruise. They’ll be tests, machines
that spin famished tubes with eyes
like steam engines hanging in space, and no matter
how deeply infrared you are, no matter
how many mean dogs you put out front
to keep away the crew from That’s Incredible, the hostility
of your stellar winds betrays how you burn
though your solitude, your heavier elements.
You’ll collapse, yes, after generations,
the blue remnants of your ancestor
are now in only your fingertips, your face
is a neutron star, a profile pic everyone can see
but no one will look at. And no matter. You’re happy
to have the chance to be ignored; just you
and your girlfriend, your dorm-room smiles
and your fingers tucked out of sight.
Photo by Simon Wilkes on Unsplash
