Lightning

Lightning

There was light too red to be white.
A shock so grand I became an albatross.
Palsied and flailing a tattoo of sinew,
Like a rag doll on the floor in the corner.
I could almost witness this from above.
This double redhead with a half-halo of ashes.
Wisps of smoke from forehead a toes.
Shoes melting on floorboards.
Charred sweat turning to salt in the soles.
That which doesn’t kill me,
Makes me tender.
Flesh almost fricasseed and roasted,
Like overdone pot roast,
Dry enough to pull the taste out of your mouth.
My drumstick arms frantically beat,
Off time rhythms on indifferent floorboards.
And the operator on the line won’t understand,
That my uncooked legs are now frozen,
They don’t move and my mouth won’t scream.
Where are my friends but gone?
Where can the rescuers enter but the window,
Blown inward by the miracle shot,
The glancing flash from the clear blue heavens,
Where the storm failed to make a stand?
It missed the metal of buildings and frames,
And sought out my center as if guided.
Should I beat my fire blacked breast?
Or put out my still smoking crown?
I cower under weight of circumstances,
If, then, why, and but.
It’s always me and never a second look.
I am a driven animal now,
Scurrying into shadows,
Ever in instinctive terror of the coming rains.
Fearing the vault of the skies.
If I move the stars will see me,
And lightning might strike twice.