earthlings

By Mai-Anh Nguyen

to the sun, earth must look no larger than a marble
that fits between two fingers. inconsequential. rolled
across floors, sidewalks, weaving between buildings

because a building is a house & a house
is a home & home is—
home is a place far from here. cradled within

rough palms is an egg yolk sun, bled raw
from a shell flecked with dirt. this must be
eden tilted on its axis, hanging just a little lower

looming over glass & steel arrogant enough
to claim they scrape the underside
of the kingdom of heaven. as such,

this earth knows how to collapse in on itself,
a predictable fate, something the heart
does not yet understand. the only inevitable thing

is gravity. maybe it’s better not to wonder
why they stopped listening & instead
wonder when exactly one is demoted

from bright kid to teenage girl.
stars were always meant to die, after all,
burning from the inside out, the brightest light

behind closed eyelids. the death will trigger
the birth of several other stars, each daughter
destined to carry the same debris

because the best elegies immortalize. the moon
turns its cheek from the memory of the collision,
pretending it doesn’t still orbit its own undoing

& somewhere, a clock ticks, two hands
circling the center of their universe,
another endless minute.