Polar Bear Watch, Elijah Perseus Blumov (June 2026)

 

Polar Bear Watch

A moment awake that feels like a dream soon turns to a dream:
I dream I awake once again to the sound
of whispers and shaking, zippers and mesh, the Greenlandic wind
that freezes the fingers clenched hard in their gloves.
We roll, you and I, at once to our feet– peer out of the tent
to meet the bewildering beige of the night,
 
this dusk never ceasing, casting a haze of dim iron light
on vast prairies desolate rolling beyond
the daze of our sight. Behind is the sea that bathes in the dried-
blood rust of the sky, glinting peach in the sun.
We can’t look too long. Our vigilance calls our eyes to the hills.
Hold still, and await the great thing that might come.
 
It’s silent, except for yipping– a fox– our shivering breath.
I squint. Seem to see the pale speck of my death,
imagine it stalking, slowly and sure. I blink, and it’s gone.
We chat for an hour. There’s nothing. No one.
To bed once again. I lie wide awake. Though nothing is near,
we’ve stalked one more day toward the nothing we fear.