He hated stars.

I knew because his eyes,

two black holes,

swallowed me entirely.

And if he had chanced to

believe in, had gazed towards

heaven,

he’d run the risk of feeling

every celestial body burning

and extinguishing into his

 

black pupils

 

where I lived,

until one night we stood grazing

a campfire and he whispered,

reverently,

“You should look up,”

and this time it was the stars

who swallowed me and

I looked down from their sky

and saw an extinguished

man.

 

And suddenly I saw that

he didn’t hate the stars,

he believed in them

but feared to.