Poem: The City Is Not Dying

Behind each set of glassy eyes
is a darkness so complete
that broken bottles glint like stars

and you button your shirt to the
top button, as if to beg,
for the embrace of an atmosphere

you cannot breathe outside of,
and hold in terror those
who float free from the tethers

gasping as they rise into nothing.
Adjust your tie and swat away
the hands that tug at you,

dazed eyes that search yours,
a constellation of shattered glass,
your own gravity is in peril.