Praise For The People At The End Of The World^[1]

’akeem

 

¹ ’bout some months ago,

we lost track of the months.

² ’twas Zeena who told me

the people—

³ ’scuse me, it’s hard to say—

the people will be gone.

⁴ ’tis the real true end

of everything. my god, it take

⁵ ’em all to tell the story,

the people I praise.

⁶ ’ear, if you have ears,

what happened. it’s quiet.

⁷ ’round here was—

we kept our word, it’s quiet

⁸ ’cuz we all that’s left,

& the trees, I want to say—

 

veronica

 

⁹ voices! I miss the sound

of fucking people. I’m on the

¹⁰ verge of—I don’t know—

I crunched the leaves to mimic steps.

¹¹ vain as I was, I can’t see

why god kept me here but for

¹² vengeance. I am alone

& don’t love myself in a

¹³ vacuum. I miss my love, we

kept our word though. it’s all

¹⁴ vacant now. you want to know?

I’ll tell you this—all this shit

¹⁵ vanished slowly, but not

by fire or

¹⁶ vices or whatever they told you.

it was us, remember that.

 

gabi

 

¹⁷ going back to the beginning,

my mom & me

¹⁸ got the call from talon—

we want to

¹⁹ go out with a bang.

how he knew, I didn’t ask.

²⁰ god, I assume, forgives

when you have a

²¹ good reason. we robbed

the rich. it’s funny,

²² guess what my mom bought first?

a bidet.

²³ giggled the whole way home,

talking ‘bout when they

²⁴ gaze at my body, cold, they should see

my ass in all its glory.

 

de’man

 

²⁵ damn, I thought they would

kill us when we started

²⁶ doling out the money. wait,

I want my last words to be

²⁷ different. I’m starting over.

I’ll tell you about

²⁸ dewan, my brother.

even in prison he

²⁹ did what any brother would—

helped me with homework. though I

³⁰ didn’t get the answers

till weeks after in the mail. when he’d

³¹ done his time, he told me

these words:

³² death ain’t shit but freedom, no need

to involve a god.

 

hunny

 

³³ here, they’ll ban guns

soon as the person

³⁴ holding one looks like us. hm,

what would you do if you

³⁵ had the money you needed?

I ate. ate till

³⁶ hunger forgot me. I’d been

so long away from full it

³⁷ hurt. we wanted to be

satisfied, that’s what people

³⁸ hunt for, not blood. something

that feels right.

³⁹ have mercy, one of the women

said to me. I’m no god.

⁴⁰ have mercy. while she clutched

her necklace & my stomach growled.

 

wesley

 

⁴¹ we kept our word.

we

⁴² wondered what they would do—

come for us? we

⁴³ waited for god & them,

no one came. maybe they

⁴⁴ wanted us to steal from them,

give them some

⁴⁵ way to feel persecuted

or pity. we

⁴⁶ worked so hard

for so little. this is not about

⁴⁷ what they had, we

were told wait wait wait

⁴⁸ when? god,

till when?

 

zeena

 

⁴⁹ zealously we lived on

until the money meant

⁵⁰ zilch. there was something

in the air & we watched—

⁵¹ zany theory by theory—people go.

those of us left know soon

⁵² zero of us will remain.

we are undead, not

⁵³ zombified but in the between part

when life is still here but all

⁵⁴ zest for it leaves. we stopped

digging, I don’t move from this

⁵⁵ zone of bodilessness. maybe it means

something to god that our

⁵⁶ zenith came to this—

a spectacular nadir.

 

chance

 

⁵⁷ change don’t happen overnight

‘til it does. we think we got

⁵⁸ choices, right? ma used to say to me

you end up where you

⁵⁹ choose to be. who chose for me

to exist? not me, never got the

⁶⁰ chance to choose to not work, to travel,

to spend my

⁶¹ childhood a child.

I can’t control all that’s

⁶² changed on me, just my response

to it & now look. you think all

⁶³ change is by god? or do we

say that cuz we don’t have a

⁶⁴ choice?

huh?

 

talon

 

⁶⁵ to everyone who asks I say

maybe god

⁶⁶ told me. I was the first

to know what was coming,

⁶⁷ tasked with spreading the word.

gabi will

⁶⁸ tell you about the bang.

I only wanted the

⁶⁹ tables turned. I lost

so many I stopped

⁷⁰ tallying the bodies, stopped

checking the cribs, tracking

⁷¹ time.

please, if this was a test, god,

⁷² take me soon.

I don’t know what’s true.

 

yessimi

 

⁷³ yes, for a moment

the people deserved praise.

⁷⁴ you should have seen it,

before the numbers dwindled

⁷⁵ young people made peace

with god, themselves

⁷⁶ yelled into the night

at their parties

⁷⁷ yanked each other into corners,

forgave their parents. my

⁷⁸ youngest called—

first time in seven

⁷⁹ years—to say I love you.

I’ve made so many mistakes,

⁸⁰ yearned for understanding

& grace came, came knocking.

 

karla

 

⁸¹ candlelight. after the end

is a return to the beginning.

⁸² chronologically, it goes—

in terms of loss—electricity,

⁸³ cars, decorum. we saw the end

of law, a glimpse of

⁸⁴ care for others, everyone

fed & without luxury,

⁸⁵ comforted, for a moment,

by sameness. if birds are here, they’re

⁸⁶ keeping quiet, watching us

perish. we

⁸⁷ kept our word, lit candles,

pulled our

⁸⁸ kin

close.

 

lianne

 

⁸⁹ look, here’s the truth.

everyone acts so resigned. if you

⁹⁰ listen, you can hear

the heartache. even those who

⁹¹ long for the world to end

don’t want it so. they want

⁹² liberation. they want people

to touch them & their

⁹³ lives to mean something.

no one gains peace from

⁹⁴ loveless silence. god?

god is

⁹⁵ laughing at us. I am angry

& unafraid to admit I’ve

⁹⁶ lost so much & no,

it never gets easier to lose.

 

maya

 

⁹⁷ my sister

has lost her

⁹⁸ mind. but before,

she was lively,

⁹⁹ model-type with cat eyes

that could slice you open.

¹⁰⁰ made every day an event. the parties?

sickening. god, she

¹⁰¹ mentioned wanting to be someone

repeatedly, I

¹⁰² mistakenly never told her

she was. so

¹⁰³ many times I could’ve—

I can’t say. I hum her

¹⁰⁴ music I can remember,

sing her songs she knows.

 

nakaya

 

¹⁰⁵ need you? no,

I am a god. I’m

¹⁰⁶ not

letting go. I

¹⁰⁷ never

let a broke bitch—

¹⁰⁸ never

would have made it! my

¹⁰⁹ nigga

the

¹¹⁰ night is

still young, you

¹¹¹ nasty, you nasty, what my sister

say? I miss the

¹¹² noise

of everything.

 

sage

 

¹¹³ some of us wanted more

from our last days, I’ll

¹¹⁴ say that. there’s so much

I won’t get to

¹¹⁵ see now. I bought

a boat, a small one, to

¹¹⁶ sail to somewhere

unfamiliar, not stress over

¹¹⁷ spending money or time,

let god’s

¹¹⁸ sun brown me further. but alone

as I am I never did

¹¹⁹ surrender a desire for roots

so I’m here, I

¹²⁰ stayed, & anyway

I know nothing about the sea.

 

knix

 

¹²¹ psalm for the people:

when I say we, I mean those who

¹²² knew the true cost

of living. we are, all of us,

¹²³ wretched for reasons

we can’t control, though our

¹²⁴ psyches say we must try to pilot

our lives. I grieve even the least

¹²⁵ honest of us, who, though not absolved,

were products of the expectations

¹²⁶ gnawing at their necks. by god, we rioted,

we slept, we succumbed to

¹²⁷ wrought divisions, we

were ambitious, foolishly tracking

¹²⁸ hours as if we

could ever know the time.

 

prince

 

¹²⁹ people will mention the loss.

I want to

¹³⁰ point out this moment—

my son, hip-tall, missing teeth,

¹³¹ planted a peony seed

in our garden. I’d explained our

¹³² predicament before, how soon

we will drop, peacefully, like

¹³³ paw paw & maw maw

& that’s alright. I

¹³⁴ prepared to remind him, he then said

it doesn’t need me here to grow. so we

¹³⁵ populated our small land with the rest

of our life. when he went, I

¹³⁶ placed him with god

among the seeds.

 

tsamuel

 

¹³⁷ tsk,

I’ve no sob story, no bes-

¹³⁸ tseller to list out for you.

the world is no accident, just craf-

¹³⁹ tsmanship. so is this

& everything else. we’d be collectivis-

¹⁴⁰ ts if evolution equaled

survival, but no, we are too shor-

¹⁴¹ tsighted for anything to last,

including ourselves. I say, we ou-

¹⁴² tsourced too many emotions—happiness,

love, belonging—our descendan-

¹⁴³ ts predestined for demise.

god, if listening, ou-

¹⁴⁴ tstretch

your hands.

 

quinton

 

¹⁴⁵ quiet now, but I hear

so many final re-

¹⁴⁶ quests—I need to get right

with god. bury me

¹⁴⁷ quickly. wait. I was & wasn’t

ready for the

¹⁴⁸ queasiness in my throat.

were we correct? a

¹⁴⁹ question for god. though divine input

never comes

¹⁵⁰ quite like you’d think. it was

& wasn’t how I imagined. still, I

¹⁵¹ quell their voices

with baseless hope.

¹⁵² quote me on this:

we kept our word.

 

re’shawn

 

¹⁵³ rally the people

hear their cries

¹⁵⁴ ragtag misfits

organize. they

¹⁵⁵ ran us down

with fear & lies

¹⁵⁶ right now we all

reclaim our lives

¹⁵⁷ rise, rise

raise our fists & voices high

¹⁵⁸ refrain from

taking compromise

¹⁵⁹ renounce our choices,

true reprise

¹⁶⁰ rebuild rebuild

till god replies

 

charlotte

 

¹⁶¹ shit yeah, I bought

that bidet when we were

¹⁶² sure it would come to

what it came to. always thought I

¹⁶³ should go out in style—

fur, face beat, silk

¹⁶⁴ shirt for comfort, slightly unbuttoned

to convince the

¹⁶⁵ shepherd I was

a good girl. no

¹⁶⁶ shame in wanting to die

fabulous when life

¹⁶⁷ short-changed me.

& why wouldn’t I

¹⁶⁸ show out to greet god? that’s

a once-in-a-lifetime event.

 

tiny

 

¹⁶⁹ today it’s quiet

but for the trees, which

¹⁷⁰ taunt their unaffiliation.

life did not begin with

¹⁷¹ two people, but none,

so without us will continue.

¹⁷² tomorrow, no one to remember

my friends, the moments that

¹⁷³ taught us, forgive me,

to come

¹⁷⁴ together, like birthdays & lectures.

imagine! someone devoting a life to

¹⁷⁵ teach what we will all forget. we kept

our word, didn’t attempt to

¹⁷⁶ tamper with anything more, buried

this here capsule of us for you.

 

 

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