Love Poem: Deleting Angels
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Written by: James Kelley

Deleting Angels

I dreamed of a fiery eyed angel,

whose only job was to sing between thunderclaps

and whisper sweet nothings into the heart

of epiphany’s persuasion.

But, she was bored.

Her muse crippled by the slow 

thrumming of an adjacent and 

mewling savant. His harp sang

beautifully, but also…redundantly

and as the storm raised its pulse,

 it clattered against my eyelids. 

Their harmony baffled my slumber,

and I rose, half awake

              …still entranced by the static of 

                                     their disheveled ceremony.

I wished that I could hear her 

speak more clearly, that the 

song wasn’t so jarring, 

to my rotting sensibility;

that I could sleep to the 

sound of something less

erratic than your three 

month old voice-mails;

repeating broken goodbyes

over and over, gestating 

in the bowels of my denial.

I reached for the phone,

and watched lightning strike,

finally realizing I was awake;

I deleted your voice from the

the memory card in my chest

and laid beneath an empty sky. 

There are no angels up there,

not really.

At least not when I’m awake. 

-James Kelley 2014, All rights reserved.