Amy Poague, “Study Abroad, Travel Light, Breathe Light

The Opiate, Summer Vol. 14 STUDY ABROAD, TRAVEL LIGHT, BREATHE LIGHT

Amy Poague

I come from the real Northern Lights. I come from a mythological lightbulb.

I study abroad in the northernmost lights in the fall, most nights.

I fall into-out-of-love whilst studying abroad in the northernmost lights in the fall, most nights, suddenly aglow right next to love, suddenly bulbous and light-lit. Philosophy

lives to be studied in tantalizing approximate proximity to the aurora borealis for hours upon hours, alight in anticipation of the Fall.

Most nights: lit by incandescent soft whites, my innocence is suddenly mythological.

Intent as an accelerating electron, light slips and falls continuously to always arrive.

In free-fall

most nights arrive forever

as auroral forms, having studied too hard while breathing too fast while gallivanting outside all night in the Northern Lights.

Aurora broke, will break, like a broken, heaving, lovelorn bulb. My aurora-philosophy will break, was already broken

when I arrived forever to lay down my suitcase full of, forged of broken glass, merged aura, disarmed aurora. 76.

I will re-pack my northernmost lightborn suitcase

inside/outside a love-breath

and a lightbulb will finally be. Invited. Inverted.

Invented.