Eliot Khalil Wilson

Of course, I’ve imagined it countless times

since, most likely, I’ll be riding the bus

when the missile or meteor ends us.

Just me and that woman with the port wine

birthmark on half her face who is inclined

to speak to total strangers, to discuss

her day at the food bank—an amaryllis

and ragged daisies no one wanted shine

atop her metal cart of damaged food.

I see that just before the blinding grace

of infinite harm, the amaryllis close

and sag like tissue, the daisies, now nude,

form the compound eye of a fly in a face

with everything, but nothing more, to lose.