a thumb slides over my life line

firm grasp with a vague promise

plum lacquered nails trace gleaming paper swords

i recall a different deck (i held the cards, once)

sprawled on a thinly carpeted dorm room floor memorizing

eons, eras, epochs gone by

you aced the exam, of course

i wasn’t enrolled in second semester honors ecology with you, but

I did harbor an affectionate grudge against the geologic time scale on your behalf

long after

i orchestrated my own extinction

intent eyes graze star charts

“this is your time to reflect, to reconnect with your past”

i honest-to-god consider it for a moment

consider unshuffling, time traveling, unraveling, exhuming, unburning

a glorious moment of daydreaming for a skeptic

outside, a sobering gasp of odorless air

a brief, dizzying indulgence in the unempirical interrupted

it’s tempting to gild these memories, to encase them in hazy amber

but i’ve gnawed all the flesh from the bones

better bequeathed to the earth for fossils