The Moon’s Magnetic Field Once Came from an Asteroid
When you walked in
it was like recognizing
the moon when he returns.
His lover bites his cheek; she
has no choice. All we see
is the dissolution, then await
the reconstruction.
Each time, the sky
yanks her into his orbit.
I want to say I’m sorry.
I want to say
You win. Our bodies are like
the confessional booth these
poems are stuck in. Even
the priest can see that sin.
You’ll be all spit and honey—
or maybe I’m the poisoned
flower gnawing on its own
lip because it has no hands
to reach for you. Only words
that are as useless as the pollen
for saying anything. I continue
to serve them even with your hands
around my throat from across
the room. Your voice is home,
I answer it like a bat guided
across the atmosphere. This
is a narrative that cannot end
well but wants to, but must.
I’ll continue to go down kicking
and you’ll be sweet as anything
until you bite back. No, it can’t
end here—we won’t let it.
Billions of years have passed
since an asteroid last hit
the moon: clearly some
magnetic fields can be sustained.
Rebecca Morgan Frank, "The Moon’s Magnetic Field Once Came from an Asteroid" from Sometimes We’re All Living in a Foreign Country. Copyright © 2017 by Rebecca Morgan Frank. Reprinted by permission of Carnegie Mellon University Press.
