by Mallory Payne
hey, we ran across the street to the bar.
there’s a forest here for now.
the light is different.
i would say you should come,
but what’s the point?
it’ll all be gone by the time you get
here. the lumber mills are staking claim
from the dancefloor. the redwoods are
falling as we speak. or i guess as i am
speaking. by the time you get here the
stumps will be rotting and the leaves
will be entombed in concrete. and
they’ll build an interstate or a suburb
or something, by the time you get here it’ll
all be gone. we’ll be gone. so hurry.
Mallory Payne (she/they) is a graduate student and poet currently working in Washington, D.C. They have a deep and profound love of the [necro]pastoral and ecopoetics. Her poetry can be found in HAD and BULLSHIT Lit, and is forthcoming in Hellmouth Press and Bleach! Magazine. They exist on X @paynemal_.