The Last Judgment
by Sherre Vernon
We’ve all seen this film: the world ending,
the family scrambling to flee the threat
of war or zombies. Somehow, they’re dressed
at midnight and the tank is full and nothing
that shakes from the walls does more
than set someone to screaming.
It used to be I’d stand there, wishing
I’d grabbed a bra or better shoes
or a sentimental trinket I could show
the person next to me in that moment
of raw connection we’re due
in times like these.
It did not happen like this for me.
In my terror, there was a curtain
separating my face from my body. I could not
reach – I could not see
when they lifted you from me, through
the humming of machines and fluorescent
drugs that held me: but I heard
your voice and caught
my breath through the tangled decades
of this life. No more daydreams
of apocalypse in the street. Only clarity.
I’ve attached every bookcase to the wall,
moved the frames away from the head
of the bed, practiced bending over you
as the earth shakes.
Every day, I watch the sky for signs, listen
to the bees. I await a harbinger
of helicopters and a reckoning
of sea. But know, my littlest me,
if a tidal wave takes this body, there is no taking
you from me. There is no fear. We are not
women who turn to salt. We are
a compassion of fire: we look back, back
past a burial mound of stars, to the faces
that would shame us, past the hands
that grasp and pull, we rise
in flame and glowing. You are the child
of the desert sea, granddaughter
of smoke, breaker of curses, she who purifies
We’ve all seen this film: the world ending,
the family scrambling to flee the threat
of war or zombies. Somehow, they’re dressed
at midnight and the tank is full and nothing
that shakes from the walls does more
than set someone to screaming.
It used to be I’d stand there, wishing
I’d grabbed a bra or better shoes
or a sentimental trinket I could show
the person next to me in that moment
of raw connection we’re due
in times like these.
It did not happen like this for me.
In my terror, there was a curtain
separating my face from my body. I could not
reach – I could not see
when they lifted you from me, through
the humming of machines and fluorescent
drugs that held me: but I heard
your voice and caught
my breath through the tangled decades
of this life. No more daydreams
of apocalypse in the street. Only clarity.
I’ve attached every bookcase to the wall,
moved the frames away from the head
of the bed, practiced bending over you
as the earth shakes.
Every day, I watch the sky for signs, listen
to the bees. I await a harbinger
of helicopters and a reckoning
of sea. But know, my littlest me,
if a tidal wave takes this body, there is no taking
you from me. There is no fear. We are not
women who turn to salt. We are
a compassion of fire: we look back, back
past a burial mound of stars, to the faces
that would shame us, past the hands
that grasp and pull, we rise
in flame and glowing. You are the child
of the desert sea, granddaughter
of smoke, breaker of curses, she who purifies