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apocalypseanthology · 2 years
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Days since departure: seven hundred and ninety six
there's no such thing as a secret
within these walls
Small Town Gossip amplifies
echoes
down the corridors
and for every friendly listening ear
there are five
who spy
for their masters
despite it all I hoped
that I had kept my heart hidden
and for your part at least
it seemed to work
too busy to notice
the lingering glance
or my hand touching
yours when we
walk
but this train has ears
and these Tracks
Talk.
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apocalypseanthology · 2 years
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Days since departure: two thousand seven hundred and sixty nine
She looks like she smells like cinnamon
And kohl
And earth
She moves like a wounded animal
Never letting me close enough to know for certain
I want to touch my hand to her face
Trace the scars
I watch her sometimes
Such a beautiful broken thing
And I think of you
It hurts my heart that every time her eyes meet mine
I'm surprised to find them brown
So I try to forget
You and her and him
But I feel like I might drown.
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apocalypseanthology · 2 years
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Days since departure: eight hundred and forty three
It doesn't matter how many times
You tell me that the water is osmotically pure
The cows' diet is nutritionally complete
The bags are vacuum sealed
Because even in my favourite mug
Habitually teabag-water-milk
Never sugar
It doesn't taste the same
And I long for the curative property
Of Yorkshire Tea
United Utilities water
And green top milk left on the doorstep.
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apocalypseanthology · 2 years
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Days since departure: nine hundred and twenty seven
I thought you might taste
Like the sweetest plum in summer
Soft and sweet and fragrant
Longed for through the seasons
But somehow you are oil and grit
Still I drink you in like lemonade
Like ice cubes on my tongue
And you burn me inside out
And make me hungry for the harvest.
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apocalypseanthology · 2 years
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Days since departure: three hundred and one
There is a music to this place
A beat
A hum
The tap of feet
The thrum of the market
The lead vocalist arms raised
Sequins in her hair
Dancing on a table top
And sometimes
The song roars around us
And other times
It whispers softly
Stay alive for me.
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apocalypseanthology · 2 years
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Days since departure: ninety seven
After the crash
I stayed in Kendal
I had nowhere else to go
And no-one else to be
The house was cold and empty
Without their voices to fill it
And loneliness crept up on me
Like weeds.
And so when the money finally came
- A brown enveloped cheque that
Somehow tried to say "here is their lives' worth in sterling" -
Our little home became a business
And voices filled the rooms again
Hot breakfasts
Sausage and egg and salted butter
And the smell of laundry
And - for the summer at least -
I could pretend I was less alone.
Then one winter
A silk blend suit but no umbrella
A single suitcase and a South American cigar
We sat fireside and reminisced
And before he left he said to me
Darling Ruth
You must know you're not beholden
To their ghosts
Their souls are gone
You do not owe this old house loyalty.
And so I followed him
Silk and cigar
To the end of the earth and beyond.
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apocalypseanthology · 2 years
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Days since departure: two thousand nine hundred and twenty one
The funny thing about all this
Is the choice I made echoes so much
My time aboard this train.
I am choosing to live
And in doing so I might be choosing to die
But staying in place is not an option
Since you chose him
And I let you.
So love each other deeply
(Like we never could)
Face the track bravely
And maybe, love, we'll meet again
Beneath a sunny sky.
These pages I leave for you
By way of a goodbye.
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apocalypseanthology · 2 years
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Days since departure: eighty two
Perhaps He likes the mystery
Mistrusting
Chosen ministers of order
To even see His face
-strange-
And yet who are we to question
Him orchestrating
Conducting behind the conduits
Biosafety protocols be damned
If we cannot dam the flow of
Followers who want to know
What's happened to the Man.
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apocalypseanthology · 2 years
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Days since departure: three hundred and sixty six
There's a name for the people
For the bodies
And I hear myself say it as if it's not bitter on my tongue
As if in the depths of the night I am not jealous
As if courage wasn't the only thing between them and me
As if I don't still find myself bringing a hand to my throat
Feeling blood pulse and breath rush
As if there aren't a thousand more of us watching their shrouded bodies
And I hear myself say it and I laugh
As if I didn't weep
For these ungrateful dead
And we who did not die.
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apocalypseanthology · 2 years
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Days since departure: two hundred and seven
The thought occurs
That I should hate you
But there's been so much heartache
That such a banal thing as hatred
Has almost been forgotten
Instead all there is
Is a question
Or more a sense of confusion
As to why your dark hair
Meets me in my dreams
Why your green eyes meet mine
Across the room
And I can't remember
Why the thought is there at all.
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apocalypseanthology · 2 years
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Days since departure: six
I could say I am here
By chance or providence or fate
But I know I cannot bear the weight of them
Seven billion or thereabouts
I suppose the individuals, the hundreds and the thousands, don't matter
When the scale is so obscene as this
Which should not be as comforting as it is
Knowing that we are a speck, a dot,
Three thousand souls alive
Amongst the horde of frozen bodies
With nothing to do but stay the course
And we
As I said before
Don't matter.
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apocalypseanthology · 2 years
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Days since departure: zero
Jubilation
Order
Stewardship
And so to bed
Daring not to sleep
Lest this could be a dream
And instead
Beholding his creation
One thousand and one cars long.
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