Bethany Mitchell
Postcards for the End of the World
1
Even then—moonlight tickles blue, skyline
humming silver with skyscrapers. Concrete vibrations
crawl through small hours,
glass black and resistant to sleep.
Voices in elevators echo
through steel. The cluttered noise of monotone
splinters—disco district discovered.
Do you remember punk? Can you recall neon?
Yes.—Yes.
There is an oil-slick loophole. A third room,
rainbow-toned rules. Press 1 to say hello,
2 for water, 3 to ask me if I’m alright.
Yes.—Yes.
2
The whistle in the undertow. Slow
tingle grows, pink sun on spine.
Melancholy and regret tomorrow.
That crisp, wooden ringing, fingers
on bone click to warm beat. Anticipation
rising, through waves now lilac, now blue, now
hazy pink of day’s end. A sad god’s window. Eyes
of love. Unrevealed. The quiet;
the busy silence, distant laughter and oars
caressing sea’s sultry skin. Already forgotten
breakfast and cotton-covered dreams.
Were palm trees always purple? No one knows.
3
Pray
for those sandy crops I tumbled in, the rock-burnt corn
and something else
the skeletal cows had torn. The song
of the wind asked me why
it always felt like this. The soil in my shoes wondered
why the rain had lost its way. I asked:
what spell was cast today? And someone laughed
two miles away. The road was grey: charcoal dust
and paper-snow. No soul
but for those cows
and me. The sun offered no balmy kiss,
but bit my skin with hateful rays.
Even then—moonlight tickles blue, skyline
humming silver with skyscrapers. Concrete vibrations
crawl through small hours,
glass black and resistant to sleep.
Voices in elevators echo
through steel. The cluttered noise of monotone
splinters—disco district discovered.
Do you remember punk? Can you recall neon?
Yes.—Yes.
There is an oil-slick loophole. A third room,
rainbow-toned rules. Press 1 to say hello,
2 for water, 3 to ask me if I’m alright.
Yes.—Yes.
2
The whistle in the undertow. Slow
tingle grows, pink sun on spine.
Melancholy and regret tomorrow.
That crisp, wooden ringing, fingers
on bone click to warm beat. Anticipation
rising, through waves now lilac, now blue, now
hazy pink of day’s end. A sad god’s window. Eyes
of love. Unrevealed. The quiet;
the busy silence, distant laughter and oars
caressing sea’s sultry skin. Already forgotten
breakfast and cotton-covered dreams.
Were palm trees always purple? No one knows.
3
Pray
for those sandy crops I tumbled in, the rock-burnt corn
and something else
the skeletal cows had torn. The song
of the wind asked me why
it always felt like this. The soil in my shoes wondered
why the rain had lost its way. I asked:
what spell was cast today? And someone laughed
two miles away. The road was grey: charcoal dust
and paper-snow. No soul
but for those cows
and me. The sun offered no balmy kiss,
but bit my skin with hateful rays.
Biography
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Bethany Mitchell has an interest in poetry which can be read ecologically. She recently reviewed Maria Sledmere’s nature sounds without nature sounds for amberflora, co-edited the zine VOICES in association with Nottingham Poetry Exchange, and her poems have been published or are forthcoming in Crêpe & Penn, lower ground 18, and (w)hole. She tweets @bethjmitch.
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