This isn’t a post about the eclipse except that the upcoming event worked its way into a poem. Strangely, I thought I was going to write something funny, but the Muse wasn’t having it. “You’ll be writing this, instead,” she whispered. And so I did.

Eclipse

There’s a barrier between us,
and you drip with slow time,
content to ride the whole thing out–
but I can’t sleep for screaming.
I suppose you’ve learned to block it out.

I imagine you surfing brainless TV waves,
still cooking food for two, leftovers squirreled
away in the refrigerator that always hated
me and spoke bloody murder at 2 AM.
Of course, tt has only sweet nothings for you.

The eclipse is coming soon, I text,
I have your glasses if you want them.
Somewhere in my anxious breathing,
I think there’s a riddle you could solve
if you only put your quickfire mind to it.

I hear nothing from you, and that nothing
stretches, becoming the wordless normal,
and I decide to get my hearing checked,
just to be sure–catastrophes are known
to strike at times like this, when one is alone.

My hearing is just fine and dangerously
good at parsing meaning from the silence.
As the moon plays its trick on the clueless sun,
I stare unblinking at the cosmic spectacle,
hoping, somewhere, you’re moonstruck, as well.