The Lightning
The lightning a salvo of flashbulbs
across the bow
of an unknown celebrity.
The windows have an honest look
to their eyes
but they're politely estranged
by the way I see things.
The rain talks
like a clock with logorhea
and the cars sizzle by
like eggs that have just been dropped
into the fat heat of a frying pan
like a wide-eyed vision of hell
though even in this
they insist upon looking at everything
sunny-side up.
The storm has spoken
though no one really knows
what was said.
Power I suppose.
Renewal and redemption.
Restoring the dynamic equilibrium
between polar opposites
by discharging pent-up emotions
like excessive baggage
unspent potential
too much voltage to bear
living so extremely at the edge of things
without jumping.
But it's an iota subscript of a lie
in the footnote of a suicide
you have to learn
to flap like a book
before you can fly like an eagle.
Or swan-dive into the abyss
with a kiss on the cross
of the constellation Cygnus.
The cops are arresting
someone across the street.
And drunk women
dragging on soggy cigarettes
in the doorways of the bars
out for a girls' night out on the town
as if they were supporting an issue
laugh like fire-hydrants with strep throat
at the insignificance of what's going down
late on a Thursday night
in a small Ontario town
where the shepherds outnumber the sheep
and everyone's looking for Little Bo Peep
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poem by Patrick White
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