Apocalypse #2
       

This bar is lit year-round with Christmas lights
reflecting off the varnished oak, drinking glasses,
and liquor stock, and a dozen little tiki lamps
sporadically glow from their stationed posts;
an aura not unlike votive candles flickering
at the feet of the Blessed Virgin.

I'm redefining what it means to sit here
in the dark. It's a shame they won't be
talking about this in the next century:
the way he pronounced vacuous when
asked to describe the room, or the shot-glass
clank tuned in perfect collective pitch.
It'll either be too hot or too cold by then,
and reading will be as ancient as laugh tracks
and patriotic cowboys, Monument Valley
now a beatific dementia that rises with
Abbadon and sets with Big Sur.

But I'm not thinking about that right now.
I'm thinking about you, whoever you are,
wrapped carelessly in a coral, melon-white
Mexican blanket on Zuma Beach with your
back to me, and whether or not it's really been
ten years since I've seen the ocean.

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Copyright © 2019 David Beebe All rights reserved
from Sugar House Review
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission