Two Meditations on a World Crashing Down – Madeline Blair

January 3, 2026

HAVE YOURSELF A MERRY

little Christmas! the world is ending & they’re partying
too loud to hear it. how many seats empty at the dinner
table this time around? working fathers stolen off streets
tinted cars driven far away from home / bloodlines wiped
from Christ’s homeland no rice O little town of Bethlehem /
the kids are getting sick they aren’t getting better / long
gone is our young morning nostalgia. & the girls say Lord
let my death be pretty & the boys say Lord I’ve got my guns
raised high. & the rich say nothing. the troubled world keeps
burning its star-bright burning.

 

 

greened

curled on the floorboards
texts taking too long
minutes turn to longer minutes
a dried pill dusted with spit
salt lamp on then off
the black cat (—which?)
then another from below
braille on a t-shirt back
from hands that cannot see
everything is a figure-eight
life is briefly a nightmare
or that’s what cowards say
focus here on this
the glasses on the table
our glasses clashing together
pay no mind to that
no one exists i think
don’t run out the door
don’t run toward the street
just stay here and breathe
& sleep & sleep
& sleepsleepsleepsleepsleep