In an Alternate Universe

by Mish (Eileen Murphy)


Dad, if for a nanosecond,

we could touch
our fingertips,

your firm fingertips
to my trembling tips,

we’d become
alternate universes.
Brushing
against one another,

not bruising,

I breathe in
your air,

and you breathe in
mine.

We exhale together
Then laugh.

It’s still light against dark here;

there’s still cause and effect
on my side of the line.

But in one parallel universe,
scared,
you slip off
into the night.

In another
parallel universe,
you sigh
with exhaustion.

While,
in yet another
parallel universe—
this one’s called Earth—

you’ll
never return.


* * * * *

Mish (Eileen Murphy) has published poetry in Fortune Written on Wet Grass (2020), Evil Me (2020), and Sex & Ketchup (forthcoming 2021). She is  Associate Poetry Editor for Cultural Weekly and teaches English/literature at Polk State College. Mish also illustrated Phoebe and Ito are dogs by John Yamrus (2019).