BIOLUMINESCENCE IN STARS

By Eve Barrette

Art by Amelia Randolph

My sister pressed

stars onto scarred mutilation

beyond repair, the corners fusing together

in a jambled stickered mess y

mascara streaks down your neck 

caught in the nook of your sweater a thread unfolds

loose string fraying at the touch bagging arteries and sloppy breaths

get tight passing through ventricles to the passage way

the abandoned train took every day at noon

the rhythm grew stale and the air slows 

water sloshing into my rain boots and filling up the air ways

of the tunnel pressure steadily rises and my lungs can't handle it

will be like this forever, not a moment before and not a second after

your prolonged goodbyes and the smell of smoke on the sweater 

i chewed holes into my gums and the saltwater stings my mouth

when the the pressure pushes against tonsils and the ctenoid barbs

grow under my fingernails while i watch the clock

start a small electrical fire in the fireplace of my abdomen 

filled with cigarette butts and an empty

home sterilized with museum wax that 

keeps my eyebrows in shape.

Have you noticed the seam you created?

A stitch starting at your elbow and coming to life when my palms

mesh flat with yours, your glowing temperament shines like a beacon

in the ocean at night where we can see nothing but the stars’ severe ing 

the bioluminescent vein connected me to you through nematocysts

do we part

and with death do we rot until the Ampullae of Lorenzini can detect

your corpse for a proper burial 

lotus flowers and water lilies expanding your trachea and breaking down

your enzymes latch to the stalks

growing in your intestines and draw out the sweet words

gargled and throaty, stuffed with dirt as you reemerge

and join the stars, unaware of the giant leap you have taken

my will for something genuine, paper mache’d to the ceiling

stars made of plastic, you and them glow in the dark

nights make it hard to see under the waves

excitedly back at me and I wonder if you mean it

then why did you reincarnate in a different realm? 

Was the ocean not big enough to escape, you ran away to the sky?

Sometimes I can still hear you under the surface

breaks and I don’t recognize where I am in my dreams

your throat makes soft sounds 

underwater and the aggressive mimicry 

the anglers start nipping at the frozen ends of your fingertips

brushing stars off torn flesh and the train doesn't come back until 

noon tomorrow so my toes will go numb

to your pernicious and confectionate tone 

heedless my dearest sister was, as it was all she could do

paste the constellation onto the ridges of the branchia

so the water couldn’t escape into

my human lungs