geheim
peace, they say, will be terrible
full of banalities and consumer
goods, too many varieties
of potatoes and onions
at the market and the neighbor
playing his drums at midnight—
this warning reminds us
to enjoy the war, bootstrap
our dreams and ration sugar
and butter and eggs for the one
birthday worth celebrating
now—forget replacing your dress
or shoes, though you’ll need
a new lover after the shooting
stops again—you’ll need a friend
in the dark wood when the wolves
come down from the mountains
as they always do, seeking
the soft and rotten flesh
of a fallen world—geheim
the sign says, and we pay heed
to signs because they’ll warn us
about the end of the world, the end
of the rope, the end beginning
all around us, every day, forever
Shy and nocturnal, Jennifer Crow has rarely been photographed in the wild, but it's rumored that she lives near a waterfall in western New York. Her work has appeared in a number of print and electronic venues, including The Wondrous Real, Uncanny Magazine, and Analog Science Fiction. She's always happy to meet her readers on Twitter @writerjencrow.
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