My shoes burning,
holes in my clothes, ashes floating,
smoky sky churning slow and thick,

stinging face, ringing ears, coughing
as I sit up in the street, city on fire,
skeleton buildings, bodies thrown about,

tasting evil in my mouth,
dizzy standing, staggering into a walk,
forever knowing this day would come,

watching a manhole cover unscrew,
someone grunts as they push
the giant lid away from their safe hole,

a man crawls out in his underwear
wearing a football helmet, bleeding
from his ears and nose, smiling at me...

"I hope I don't look as bad as you," he says.

"What?" I ask, bewildered.

He points down to my shoes on fire,
"I'd do something about that."

I stamp them out.

He adjusts his helmet and squints around,
"That was one heck of a bomb.
This is like being in hell... Fire, fire, everywhere."

I swallow hard,
everyone dead, or wanting to be.

"My name is Chuck," he says. "What's yours?"

"I don't remember."

Chuck grins.
"Maybe that's good,
because this is all your fault."

"What are you talking about?"

Chuck laughs until I laugh.
He glares at me.
He says, "You're an asshole."

I frown at him.

Chuck turns and runs down the street
in his underwear and helmet yelling,
"Head to the hills! Head to the hills!
He is you!
He is me!
He is the guy not knowing his name!"

Holding my head between my hands,
noticing my shoes on fire again,
I weep for the fire inside our blood.