The Kudzu Review
Here Comes Rubie Jamie, the Beginning of a Great Career, & Other Ways to Think About the End of the World Kiersten Kiara Wright (For my ancestors, at once dead and alive)
We should just think of it like The waltz at the end of the world— A high-school homecoming dance Where the DJ only plays unreleased ABBA And all my unfinished poems set to a lyre— So now we all have an excuse to wrap ourselves In a few yards of abbey-cream-colored chiffon With nothing underneath and pretend it’s a toga— And it’s the last day of the empire of everything, Which means it’s the last day of my period, So I don’t care anymore if Mother Nature Slaps a rosso corsa Rorschach to my ass— Because the end of the world is Mutually assured destruction— And if any time is the time To practice Cold War politics, it’s now, On the dawn of another ice age— When the thought of our frigid and blue bodies Will eventually cajole us into kinship and kumbaya, So we can do whatever we please to appease The id iceberg that lurks in every one of us— Dot dot dot, dash dash dash, dot dot dot— I know the end of the world is The day we finally get to meet the person, Dead or alive, we once told a date we’d like to dine— Because, now, I’m munching on hors d’oeuvres 40
