Late Space

I’m waiting for space to approach time
the way sound races behind some Mach-numbered aircraft,
fast and nervous like locker room glances.
Space is just doing its best existing. Time on the other hand
acts exactly as one would expect time to act.
 
Theory I: If one can be late in terms of time,
then one must be able to be late in terms of space.
 
A late space if you will—a solar significance in still dark,
nullity tucked in a trench on the Kelvin scale,
sun gods corroding like ancient papyrus.
 
Theory II: If I could condense spacetime, if I could pull it
like a string, if I could just get it to bend…
 
I can ask the gods if that’s what you want—Helios post-hospice,
Apollo palsied and pale, some unnamed goddess
shriveled in her brightly colored nightgown.
 
Theory III: You are far from where I wait.
You are at the beginning, the start of infinity.
 
And so I think back to when we were on the same plane,
the two-dimensional spacetime of us,
the ends of time swaying like polar-wind branches.
This was back when we thought the golden spiral meant something,
back when we tried to keep up with transcendental numbers.
 
Theory IV: In that dense and molting pinprick of energy,
the one where it all started, that’s where I’ll find you again.
 
If I can ever find the courage to leave. If I can ever preexist.