and sings. A boy cuts the goat’s heart from its body
and plants it. Weeks later, a herd of bumblebees
bubbles out of the dirt. The boy’s wristwatch, stopped
since autumn, starts ticking again. Several miles away,
it’s autumn. Rain congeals into snow. Apple trees grow
oranges while nobody’s watching, while everyone’s
asleep. Hundreds of miles away, in the hospital, a girl
dies slowly, spitting at her doctors’ hands. Weeks later,
she goes home. I don’t know how it happened. I didn’t mean
to survive. A bee stings the back of the boy’s left knee.