by S. Pippin

Space is Silent 

Driving home, I’m tempted to keep going
around the bend, beyond the line of trees. Someplace far away
moons are forming in a disk of cosmic dust around a distant exoplanet.
Lonely waits in quiet so loud it screams

around the bend, beyond the line of trees, someplace far away
the sun is setting on a day that’s gone nowhere.
Lonely waits in quiet so loud it screams.
Scientists say we may soon extract energy from black holes.

The sun is setting on a day that’s gone nowhere.
Mercury is shrinking
Scientists say we may soon extract energy from black holes.
I want something more tonight than listening to the cat crunch brown Purina stars.

Mercury is shrinking,
and moons are forming in a disk of cosmic dust around a distant exoplanet.
I want something more tonight than listening to the cat crunch brown Purina stars.
Driving home, I’m tempted to keep going.

***

Katie Asks Why Not Be Optimistic

Listen, Katie, hope is not that easy.
Humanity is a collision of red and blue
chaos, a giant slop of disharmony

that’s killing us and the planet. You can’t
just order up a box of hope and be an optimist
by noon tomorrow—you’ve got to create your own.

I learned from the experts:
I sat out front and watched Jack
shoot hoops in the driveway, over and over

and over till he had nineteen in a row, one
more than yesterday. Gracie and I picked
dandelion puffs and blew them into the breeze,

fingers crossed they’ll root in the grass.
Let’s fill the yard, Grandma, grow wishes
for everyone. All afternoon, we seeded

our future: yellow flowers and fluffy white
globes stretched across a wide green lawn
under a bright chrysanthemum sun.

 

About the photographer: S. Pippin is a writer and photographer whose work has appeared in The Saturday Evening Post, Mud Season Review, and other publications. On Twitter @SPippin2.