The Middle of the Night

There was an explosion and I came outside. I thought I had woken up

but because you were already on the porch, I must have been asleep. We must be dead.
We must have died in the explosion, everyone we know must have died
in the explosion, this is it, you said, and it was the metal voice of the vacuum cleaner
I embrace this end, infinity, us forever standing together
on the porch, waiting for the inevitable mushroom cloud
that comes with these types of explosions. I take your hand and
you pull away, a little angry, you don’t want to wait out

infinity with me. There is no mushroom cloud and I realize

there must have been some sort of accident, there are bodies everywhere,
no, there are just two. Some idiot had driven right through the stop sign on our block
and had crashed into the front of someone’s house. It was our house.
There are two bodies on the lawn. You are already on the porch, wide awake,
shouting to me to call the police. I must have stood there forever
with you telling me to call the police. I wanted to see the bodies up close,
to see if they were someone we knew, you said I shouldn’t touch them,
I’m not supposed to move someone so soon after an accident. I nod because
that’s what they say on TV, too.