‘End of Our World (A First Indication)’

By Delina Goxho

Photography Alex Robertson

You tell me to proceed along agonising isles of near-empty shelves

You say don’t turn around

Don’t slow down

just keep going, get the milk, I’ll get the flour

Orpheus turned around on purpose – Pavese says he couldn’t bear to bring back a pale, lifeless soul it wasn’t her anymore

I turn around

I want to see what it feels like to tell you through a convoluted, obscure metaphor

that I also don’t want to bring you back

To my sun-struck little room

To the dormitory where you slowly said once – Am I ruining your shirt if I pull here

and that was a sign already

of your lack of defiance

to be leaving someone at the height of a potentially-apocalyptic-end-of-time makes for a fairly good story if we survive

an excellent one if one of us dies

and no story at all if we both die.

---