The rain, a thick boxer who never goes down,
sucks air for another round. The dirty gray sky
is a tarp tied down on a pickup load
of stained mattresses and plastic toys: the scraps
may flutter but nothing's coming loose. Maybe
there's work in Oregon. Maybe not.
A thrash in the river, like a snag but moving
slowly into shore, something huge
but invisible: a sea lion, or a sturgeon
striking at a school of -- something, that
spatters the water like black coins. Time
was we would gone down to the water
hoping to see wonders. Today we hunch
our shoulders and back off to the spine of the levee:
anything that hunts small helpless running things
is no friend of ours.
In response, not very obviously, to this Morning Porch post
5 comments:
Love the poem Dale. Like this so much:
"The dirty gray sky
is a tarp tied down on a pickup load
of stained mattresses and plastic toys"
This is what rain does in Chennai, but we are nowhere close to rains now. It is gruellingly hot SUMMER here.
Ugh, in April? Yeesh.
I love how it opens with the thick boxer that never goes down. Kapow.
Here to read it again... I am honored to have had a small role in sparking such a fine poem.
The boxer, the tarp, black coins...amazing images for things I struggle to describe. They set such a tangible mood.
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