From Nothing
Hayley Phillips

You chasing me through
           the church at midnight, both
                      of us half-starved
 
Me at the pulpit, naked,
           pretending I'm full of god
                       and taking your last pill
 
Later, your mother laboring
           to breathe seasons like air
                      in and out of a lung
 
My mother made of ghost
            stories and important particles
                      named after men
 
Our mother the tiny
            planet whirling in the dark,
                     blind bee on a string
 
And all the fathers on
            the outskirts, aftermath
                       corners of the eyes, buried
 
Next to our hearts
           like a sphere of air, a shard
                       of bone, a little bomb
 
One theory of connection
          is that we're tethered,
                      riding misshapen gravities
 
I never saw you
          in the snow or the ocean
                     but a baptismal pool --
 
Though your water and mine
         have been all three time
                    and time over, we
 
Have maybe been each
        other – all this to say
                    my electricity remembers yours,
 
Tendril of me whipping
        raw in the wind, time
                    folded over and sewn shut.

 
                                                  Previously published in New Note Poetry

                                                                                    ~ ~ ~
​                                                                                                                  MAY 2026