We Can Run Away

When the trees are gone and
their bark peels away like an
old snake skin, and when the
sun forgets its place and falls,
shrinking until it is a marble,
maybe then we can run away.
When only a film of gray dirt
envelopes the Earth where the
atmosphere used to be, when
even the buttermilk sky looks
rotten and flakey, spitting up
coal for rain and soot for air,
maybe then we can run away.
Maybe then we can change,
and maybe we can remember
what our love meant. Maybe
I will memorize your eyes by
candlelight and feel the depth
of your voice as if your words
buried themselves beneath my
ribs and stayed there forever.
Maybe then we will fight over
which road of dirt to take and
which piece of wet pavement
looks more like home, but we
will not run away alone. So
then you will whisper dreams
about what the sunset used to
look like and create ghosts of
lives that we will never live.
Maybe all we will have left to
drink will be cough syrup, and
maybe then you will see me cry.
But maybe then you will kiss
me every night, and I will feel
your soft whispers in my chest
like a warm stream of honey.
When grass becomes a myth –
When the birds look like snakes
and the snakes look like dragons –
When storms become hurricanes –
When the desert starts to freeze –
Maybe then we can run away.
Maybe then we can escape, only
to find everything we wanted.