by Joshua Scammell

soot on the boot and it’s normal to say you hate / it here. But the world is not so dry as that, and  / even if you have to dig up a “can of peach / es” to drink it, the moisture still exists, and if / you listen carefully enough, you can drink it / off the wind directly, in the form of birdsongs / or a simple breath which begins and ends with a / prayer, and when you share your thoughts on the tip of / your tongue, when you write a draft on the lip of the / wind, time will rewrite it, just how your higher self / wanted. a pilgrimage over parched earth, you lick / your cracked lips. and look! every human still living / is here, you’re all together, murmuring a fruit / ful debate around a kerosene fire, and / you learn so much from the playful talk, and the words / are not very important, and they never have / been. what matters is the moisture! so you pass a / round a gilded goblet; red solo cup, and some / one pokes the fire with a stick, and you do some / sort of ritual that no one quite understands, / but no one wants to point out that you’ve just invent / ed this ritual on the spot, but you didn’t / do the ritual, the ritual never hap / pened, you just got tired of talking, and listened / together to the moisture spraying up from the / distant pier, where sleepy fishermen bring back their / empty rods from the sea, and they don’t mind that they’re / not eating tonight because it’s not them who dies / of hunger, it’s someone else, and it feels fairly / good to die of hunger, if you get yourself in / the right mindset. and even though they try really / hard to avoid it, when it cannot be avoid / ed, it’s better to accept it. well, that’s them, and / this is you. your eyelids crack open, shedding sand. / most of the people have died by this point. the air / is so dry that you think you’ll die of dehydra / tion before hunger, and you decide not to drink / your own pee. instead, you use your last bit of en / ergy to perform an ancient rite, which is in / fact brand new, and you have no idea how time / circles back on itself, and you, the last man, call / yourself adam, and you’re so far away from your / eve. heh, the pain of feeling yourself turn into / a rock begins to set in, and as your marrow / becomes a bone, you know god, and feel the buzzing / sensation spill down the top of your head, and / a warm hand touches you upon the spine right in / that spot where you carry all your shame and your wor / ry and the stress of the body, and the spirit, / and the mind, and heh, you were never quite comfort / able in life, were you? always thinking your pos / ture was slightly wrong and you were holding your face / in a bad way. but all doubts vanish so ver / y quickly, quicker than rain, which comes down in a / flood all at once, and wipes away the tears of the / earth, that weeping mother, blessing up all that scar / tissue you left behind, and /—stars shine! the oneness with god sets in for all, a / crowd of clapping ancestors, it’s over! a bath, / a shower, a soup that has no name, and there’s so / many of us, and also just one. heh, and it chang / es so fast, the visitors from outside your house / allow themselves to intrude upon you. but their / intentions are so good that you barely notice. / they whisper little messages, little bubbles / of moisture to find in the morning, when you wake / up from this dream. you’ll have no idea how to / write it down. but you’ll remember the moisture, a / little fibrous bubble of death, and some days you / drink it, and other days you die of thirst with moi /sture there. “another day, another apocalypse.