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The book The House of the World has been nominated for the Pulitzer Prize and is now available on Amazon.

Author: Mary Waterfield

Absolute Zero

It is a vine covering the page
as I write,
black on the bleached surface
of the paper.
The tendrils of the script
form a lattice of words.
If I were the last one alive
they would soon mean nothing.

A decoration of strands,
black webs,
scrolls and junctures,
and I would be gone,
leaving only these trails
of what I said.
Why my heart broke.
How I suddenly
found myself alive.

But the vine keeps reaching
as I write.
My heart doesn’t stop.
I am full of a forest.
Perhaps a flower will suddenly appear
among the branches.
A rose will open its golden center.
Someone will water the ink
with their kiss
and say,
I love him,
or,
I loved him.

And the thread
reaching the edges of the page
will dangle over the table,
and touch the earth
where everything began,
and will become
no less a mystery
than all the roots
that live in the soil,
ready to bloom,
or return to absolute zero.