OLBERS' PARADOX

instead of the moth-nibbled tarp that flaps 

soundly now above us, instead of all this faint 

topography and solar grit, the astronomers

are saying the sky should bare a superdense

sheet of stars, to hell with constellations,

the night minded only by one devastatingly 

bright eye. it sounds right: do we not endeavor

to hold one another, even in this endless

space? let it be known I’m glad it’s not true. 

this fact would be too much and too 

beautiful. nothing would get done. we 

would overextend our necks and spend 

all the dark hours weeping. it would be like

a mass synchronous cellular orgasm 

or a mid-autumn so golden it entered

the blood or a day where nobody died 

or those mornings when I wake up 

before you to the static of early rain 

and your face is so wantless and still 

and mine and you’re not even being 

a person and you’re perfect still perfect 

and I have to turn away because I can’t

bear to look because there’s something 

there writhing in you that if considered

for more than a pulse would open me up

it would open me up then undo me

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