Jeff Newberry
Four Days Before the End of the World
In memory of Jake Adam York (1970-2012)

i.

What did the Mayans know about the death

of poets? Not much, I’d argue—

watching the sky, they appeased

old gods with the death of others,

pitched screaming men & women

down burning canyons,

all in the name of silent gods.

ii.

Now, rain breaks three days

of late humidity. Apocalyptic,

these temperatures. Air conditioner

humming a week before Christmas.

My wife says it’s always been

this way: The weather in the south

is crazy she says. & maybe

(I think) she’s right:

the end has been happening all along.

iii.

I once dreaded the end.

A back-row Baptist teenager,

I dreamed of the earth in shards,

the oceans evaporated, an angry God’s fist

shaking the ground. Lava spurts

into the air like a carotid split.

A friend died yesterday & I

though of my father’s funeral,

how the preacher’s words hung

in the air like dust motes.

I never found the right words

& couldn’t croak out the hymns.

Twenty years ago, I stood a child

in a South Georgia graveyard

& wondered how I’d face

the Rapture without my father there.

Surely, I knew I’d be left behind.

The world didn’t end, though I planned

for it, though I tried to drown

in alcohol & pills, though I spit

hate at the sky.

Dared God to face me. Come on down

& explain himself to me.

I threw myself at the ground.

Tried to silence God’s night sweats.

My words hung in the air

like bourbon blues

the first dawn promise

after a three-day drunk:

useless, ornamental.

iv.

The world is set to end.

Maybe the end will be bang.

Maybe a whimper.

Or maybe it’s something like this:

I stare out at the remnants

of a storm. Sun glows

through thunderheads.

I speak & my words

cloud the glass.