Lisa Nielsen and Bridget Fahey

BRIDGET FAHEY

The Sentinel

inspiration piece

No Rapture Here

Lisa Nielsen

Response:

You were supposed to be looking out for me
Instead you moped around uprooting trees
What kind of protector are you any way
Enticing the wayward into thinking broken glass can’t cut them

You never stepped in
Even when my heart insisted it was made of concrete
What lesson can the unloved
take away from clammy neglect?
That exposure will never lead to comfort
And that vulnerability breeds fear upon contact

I always have the option of surrender, but no one is asking

Nothing since has lived up to the despair of
my closets being emptied
their contents gathered into a shopping bag
while I waited to hear the terms of my banishment

Where were you then?
Savoring the life of an apparition?

I wish it was quieter here but their voices are chattering beside us

the scars are so persistent
they convinced me their iridescence would get back at you

Platitude will not save you from the past
Because it stubbornly hovers at your ankles
there is no escaping
while you suck up all the air
with a single sneer
but me and the dallying corpses will be waiting for your return