Are stars as lonely as they look?
We are their children. They watch us
with longing, luminous
in the thoughtful night. Sometimes
I lose track of myself and think
of us, all the ways we are broken.
Are we as lonely as we look?
We watch each other with longing.
Let me start again. The earth
is full of voices that call to us
with longing. This is all I will say
of our situation. Anger
over grief, terror in full throat,
we carry on not knowing
if the cat is alive or dead. (Either way
the cat doesn’t care what we know.)
This is how we carry on. Phones
in one hand, distractions
in the other we fall into darkness bespoke,
the nil that spins the galaxies.
Are we measured in the dark?
We might live but then again
a star might whisper zero
and welcome us home
is what I’m trying to say.
—
Robert Rice’s work has appeared or is forthcoming in various literary magazines, including Michigan Quarterly Review, Manoa, New Letters, The North American Review, Quiddity, Hayden’s Ferry Review and others. A poem has been nominated for the 2024 Pushcart Prize. Rice’s chapbook Space that Carries Light Forever has been selected by Jane Hirshfield as one of two entries in the 2023 Wildhouse chapbook competition, published in April 2024.
