This Is How You Lose the Time War

by Amal El-Mohtar

She has won, which is not an unfamiliar feeling. She is happy, which is.

I want to meet you in every place I ever loved. Listen to me—I am your echo. I would rather break the world than lose you.

I love you. I love you. I love you. I’ll write it in waves. In skies. In my heart. You’ll never see, but you will know. I’ll be all the poets, I’ll kill them all and take each one’s place in turn, and every time love’s written in all the strands it will be to you.