Phone Call From Opposite Ends of the Bridge by Trinh Tran (16, California)*

Tonight there’s a bloodbath of stars & the black  
                               disemboweled sky. The naked corpse of moonlight desecrates  
everything we could ever touch. You’re begging me to hang up  
              but I only open my other palm, slathered in red.  
I’m waiting for you  
              to hold my hand or my heart but either way you just won’t  
let go of the phone. I’m so scared that I can’t hear what you’re saying & I want you  
              ​to promise me that you’re still there, darling, are you there?  ​

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Your eyes are twin bullets with nothing reflected except guilt. I’m baring my skin to you 
                      ​& you still won’t do it, you won’t look at me. Just look at me.  
                                      Look at me until I’m consumed in the apocalypse of your fallen  
dreams & all I know is singing rivers  
                                                        —all I know is the meaning of a bridge at night.  
             I’m clenching the phone like a lifeline & saying I love you so much  
it hurts me to see you this way. Smile if you can hear me  
                                 through the static. You don’t & I don’t know  
what to do besides whisper it like a prayer, I love you, willing it to tear through  
​                                                     the bridge & the night & the oxygen between us.  
I’m here, on the other end, waiting to convince you that the world is beautiful. 

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