January

Issue 40

After everyone abandons the planet, it rolls over the sky’s footpath like a trash can. Garbage litters the streets. The inhabitants must have left in a hurry. Or perhaps they didn’t want to bother to tidy their places before they left – why try to make a place spotless where no one will ever live? The wind goes through the towns lifting empty grocery bags that follow the trail by which the sun vanished. A storm sends its rain hands to scrub the blocks, the dusty porches, the streaked windows. A river crawls into each town, flows through a temple door, trying to salvage God’s body.