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UV Blues Her limbs are as firm as math. She wears three ironic triangles. Her eyes repeat the sea. A faint and faintly damp blond down extends the aura of her hair. Her lips do not leave the yogurt cone they kiss, but if they did, would speak essences. The lone, arrested wave extrudes not foam but hands, reaching and pointing. Other beings on the beach, nonviable in this medium, are subliminal smoke. Though the rotation of the planet is stilled, two are not harmed though one is ordinary. Meanwhile the smile exists. Till a phone rings that offers the ever-immanent Other, his imbricated bêtises, charms, and money. That sound was always there. The being beside her lets sand sift through his hand, wishing time would return. It’s Alive 1 Universal ruin doesn’t faze the zombies. They think (so to speak) a field has been cleared so they may freely assemble, demonstrate. Except for hunger, they are free from pain. As they mill, bump, parts sufficiently rotted, or burnt by things still burning or searingly melting, drop; the rest falls, groans more, moves more awkwardly. Crows are too high, rats too fast, roaches hard for their poor hands to catch; and the zombies think it’s unfair there are no brains left. In herds around them, meanwhile, vampires have adopted the umbrella phalanx and the shared tarp, and scuttle in shadow beneath these, squealing and bitching. They too recognize no responsibility. Sing their thirst, the total inadequacy and betrayal of all beings below them; that is their art. Periodically one or another drops its umbrella or ducks out from beneath the tarp to take a short walk in the sun; that is their spirituality. Surviving humans, unsurprisingly, are soldiers. And have learned, though late, how to inoculate themselves against the undead: they weep. Constantly. Sincerely, like a living fountain for all the living and unliving. It acidifies the blood, changes the brain. Which doesn’t mean these puffy-eyed sharpshooters ranged in the rubble for this final battle have forgotten how to put one in the head or in the heart. 2 The brilliant scientist is no fool. The contacts may be placed absurdly on the whorls and protrusions of the monster on the gurney. The flatlined monitors may lie. He’s armed , the scientist, and never wholly diverts his attention from the body. The general, though a mind steeped in protocol the event offends, glares steadily at a claw. Data flows to his ear from the site. Whether deep undersea, or in ice, or a cordoned field of strange non-metal, it represents a power that will be matched, will be *crushed. The soldiers also know the score, their rifles on full automatic, leveled. If I used eyes they’d be shut.