The Seven Sisters by Caitlin Reynolds

It was cold while we stood in your backyard

Looking upwards to the night sky for clarity

For a quiet moment you had your arm around me, my head tucked under your chin

I pointed to a small, twinkling constellation and you said that it was the Seven Sisters

Later I researched it and learned it was formed 100 million years ago

it’s thought that early skywatchers could see more stars in the sky than we do today

Their skies weren’t obstructed by pollution, their eyes not tricked by satellites

The sky didn’t have poison in it yet

and I thought about what it would have been like, to see the sky like that

and then I thought about our hearts as the sky

What would it be like to have a heart not yet corrupted by poison, by disappointments and deceptions

That clarity just came with the territory

The Seven Sisters is 400 light years away

and I thought about how I have felt so far away

from people

People I have loved

People I have trusted

how I couldn’t see any stars because my own sky had become so blurred

Blurred black and blotted out

and I get the feeling you’ve had to look at a sky similar to mine

and I think about how living with the pollution just became second nature

That maybe I didn’t want to see any of those stars

Maybe if I did it would devastate me too much

But I guess when you kissed me I didn’t feel like I was 400 light years away

I could feel my feet on the ground

and we shared a cigarette

I looked back up at the sky and you looked at me