Deluge
By Mike Allen
16 November 2009
"Every time you take a drink of water, you're drinking recycled star material. Our bodies are created entirely of star stuff."
—National Geographic
When he learned he could drink the stars, he vowed
that even one burning sphere could never be enough
to quench the thirst that ached in all his shriveled cells;
he longed to pour galaxies down his throat, consume
cold dwarfs and exploding novas, suck cotton candy
nebulae through his teeth, chew the baby stars
inside like sunflower seeds, wolf dark matter gulfs
in gassy gulps and mow through Andromeda spirals
like a starved teen through meatlover's pizza. He longed
to turn himself inside out. Envelop and swallow
the universe. Stuff his stomach on bloated creation.
Spill acid back to the Big Bang. Show God
how real cleansing gets done, primordial soup
breakdown way more wicked than Noah's flood.
Copyright © 2009 Mike Allen
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Aside from editing the critically-acclaimed Clockwork Phoenix and Clockwork Phoenix 2 anthologies, Mike Allen writes fiction, including the Nebula Award-nominated short story "The Button Bin," and poetry, for which he's won the Rhysling Award three times. The Philadelphia Inquirer dubbed his verse "poetry for goths of all ages." He also edits and publishes a poetry journal, Mythic Delirium. Its 10th anniversary issue, released earlier this
year, held a new poem from Neil Gaiman. Mike's poetry also appeared this year in Nebula Awards Showcase 2009 and Best New Horror of the Year, both edited by Ellen Datlow. Mike's latest short story is "Stone Flowers" in Cabinet des Fées, with more to come in Sky Whales and Other Wonders (Norilana Books, Dec. 2009) and Cthulhu's Reign (DAW, April 2010). He and his wife Anita live in Roanoke, Va., where he works as the arts and culture columnist for the city's daily newspaper. You can also check out his blog and his
previous work in the Strange Horizons archive.
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