Marriage Proposal
Michael Meyerhofer

I want us to be happy
as dogs on a beach.
The sun is warm and far away.
Yesterday, I told you
crane flies have no mouths,
only last a hundred hours.
One found its way
into our motel room
but you used the empty
ice pail so that it might
perish in daylight. I keep writing
that all iron comes
from dead stars.
I can’t help it. Such
things must be repeated,
as hammers say.
My love, our bones
hold us up so sturdily
that when we die,
nothing will eat them.

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