| Rear | Front |
| Pulsation of the fontanelle beneath thin skin. | Flicker of the matrix. Grain of digital noise. |
| The invisible umbilical cord of our shared sleep. | The taut nerve of an encrypted frequency. |
| The child’s heavy head presses on my forearm – | my only proof of earthly gravity. |
| A plastic bird cuts the wind at thousands of metres – | precise calculation of the impact point. |
| A hand carefully adjusts the swaddle. | A finger lingers over the release button. |
| I have learned every curve of this fragile body. | Every second to impact has been calculated. |
| The whisper of a lullaby extinguishes night terrors. | The emptiness of ether where a stranger’s scream once was. |
| Here I hold the world together so it does not fall apart. | There I return shadows back into the earth. |
| Eyes count every eyelash in the half-dark. | Sight catches the glowing silhouette of the target. |
| I listen to the rhythm of kindred breathing. | Countdown to the flash. |
| I draw the perimeter of soft silence. | The route of inevitability has already been plotted. |
| Nearby it smells of vanilla and baby hair. | Beneath my eyelids a stranger’s thermal signature still smoulders. |
Earthly Gravity
27