All those eons spent worrying about demons
and in the end it was tumbleweed
that took us. Wave after wave of rootlessness
blocking doors and piling up
outside two-car garages, the future drifting
from town to town, beyond saving.
I stand at the kitchen sink, rinsing the latest brand
of salvation with golden dust.
You sit at a chipped table, reading a manual
on how to catch shadows,
a pair of wings slung useless over the back of your chair,
a claw curled around your glass of whiskey—
our apocalypse written not in red skies rising
but in text messages torn from the backs
of cereal boxes and video game cheat sheets.
Off in a corner, a pair of zombies
deals death out of a marked deck as Milton
counts credit cards with his fingertips.
When the doors swing suddenly wide, we’re hoping
for even a ghost of a showdown,
but it’s only a couple of stuntmen and a wookie
selling the holographic version
of High Noon. Even so, you raise your glass as the undead
devour their lines and swarm toward an unseen sunset.