"teeth broken from winter's harsh bite"

The night a comet
with its silver tail
tucked between its legs
fell through darkness
to rest in the Wades'
dead field
Papa stood
on the back stoop
unmoving, wolf
starved in metal trap
teeth broken from winter's
harsh bite.

In the back of the shotgun
the crooked step jutting
out like a lip, he could see
the sky neck, feel the stars
shake they heads

That night he threw
the fallen stone
back to sky
the stars watched
it all come down
to ruined earth again.

Sky would not take back
what she had done
the fields spent,
barren.

From "Fallen" by Sheree Renée Thomas. See the rest at Strange Horizons.


"The Great Comet of 1861", illus. from Bilderatlas der Sternenwelt, E. Weiss, 1888