“Information Worker at the End of the World,” a Poem by Stephanie Niu
From the Collection “I Would Define the Sun”
When the ship to Mars has already departed,
and my wealthiest friends have plots in New Zealand
for their children, or have no children, what box
do I put my treasure in? I have one waterproof bag
that clips at the top. Every month, money drips
into my retirement account. You think the world
will still be around when you’re sixty-five? I don’t know
what it means to survive. I’ve learned all I can
about the Svalbard seed vault. I used to spend time
on the names of birds until the warblers disappeared.
The earth is more burned out than my coworkers.
The mantle is deathly dry. My doctor tells me
I ought to moisturize. Weekly, my milk expires.
I panic when I flip to a new month on my free
Audubon calendar. There is too much time
and not enough of it. I’m a bad steward caught
red-eyed. I board flights, order takeout high,
forget to recycle. Some days I wake and resolve
to arm myself for a righteous fight. I will make
coffee grounds into face scrub, eat kombucha
bacteria raw! Other days I wake already late
to my first meeting, say hello brightly
though the laptop screen is all my gunked-up
eyes can see. A blue glow sized to a day, an hour,
an act of speech. Everything else beyond me.
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I Would Define the Sun by Stephanie Niu is available via Vanderbilt University Press. This poem first appeared online and in print in Ecotone Issue 32.
