November 9, 2018
Most days I wake up hoping today is the day we’ll get bombed by North Korea. I know many of my fellow Americans don’t feel the same. But who among them is kept up at night listening to that hoarse, rattling cough? Listening as it slowly builds up, like the dread in the pit of my stomach, to a deep phlegmy hack, listening as it finally collapses in dry heaves over the sink. I clutch the blanket over my head and burrow down deeper, into a different reality. Oh to reach down into those diseased lungs, gingerly, gently, pluck each tumor like a ripe raspberry from the strawberry walls. Wash them away, down the sink with the blood and the mucous. Rest my head on his chest, and listen to his deep clear inhale and exhale. Fall asleep next to my love and awaken hoping we don’t get bombed by North Korea.
When We Were the Birds 