Or when the boys shoot you with their plastic
Cap guns, aiming at the force of life you
Retain by magic accident

A standoff begins as soon as
It ends:
You raise a pointed finger at the group
          Thumb cocked, threatening to fire back
They turn their heads, drop their guns and laugh, attention
Snagging on something else, firearms now
Toys, you a mere abstraction, barely a figment of a simple
Boy’s 8-bit imagination

Your head is empty
A spider lives inside it
You decide: the next time you are shot at
          Shredded by invisible gunfire at dusk
                    You will spin on your heels, then
Collapse under a tree, arms outstretched and
Unmoved, rising only when you feel the chill of midnight

Maybe in between time you will dream of eternal life in heaven, or
The end of the world

…

Tristan Foster is a writer from Sydney, Australia. He is the author of Letter to the Author of the Letter to the Father and 926 Years, co-authored with Kyle Coma-Thompson.