A Call

(album: ICYMI - 2022)

I was looking for you in the garden
The shadows under the trees perforated night skies
I found it hard to see in the glare
The only response to a call was the rustle of leaves, birdsong
Your name diffusing through the undulations in the air
The kitchen doors were open
Checked the fridge before continuing
Skipping stairs was a stretch but still a habit

Years later a couple lanes away from where we lived
I watched an asteroid break up on entry
Bright limbs streaking across a black sky
What were the chances?
Miracles unfolding overhead
Drinking in the park

I could never explain the pit in my stomach
Frantic, nervous pacing through the house
(If we act like things are not spiraling out of hand
Does that make them so?
If a thought goes unspoken does that erase it?
The unbroached belief when my friend died decades later
That subconscious echoes carried him through me)
But it never rears its head when it can be reasoned with
The world ends on a quiet weekend
Not through diagnoses, emergencies, collapses
Although I hate thinking that memories bend

Cars were still parked outside
If the rapture had happened, why was it unrecognisable?
Why was the sky blue?
Why did no one tell me?
Did these things not announce themselves?
And when I found you, you told me to wash my hands
I'd been playing outside
And spoke nothing of the end of the world
Does that mean it never happened?