Droughtfall

Ezren “Ren” Herzog

In memory of Daniel Davis Aston, a victim of the Club Q shooting in Colorado Springs

I need to sleep 

but the words I don’t say sit 

in the fiery pits of my upper chest.

These thoughts, they race,

threaten to light up the ashtray

that is my throat.

I see his picture, angelic marks

kissed his chest in two curving rivers.

He fed them fresh rainwater for months,

years, perhaps. I think 

of the bullets entering his body,

rippling the surface, striking the depths,

draining the ocean he was, 

the rivers with it.

Through the tsunami, I hear

a small soothing whisper: happy at least

that he was blessed before he was taken.

He had his rivers, his rainwater,

the currents others fight over. 

For many of us, the time we are given

feels borrowed, unjustly ours.

All our birthday parties are surprises;

we are always holding up 

our wrists to check our watches

for the clock ticks faster.