by Caley O’Dwyer
Blue opens
until we no longer know
where sadness began.
Sorrow follows
through green fields
above the sky.
The light has changed
to shine through
our origins,
which lie so far South
it is nearly dark here.
There is only
the green calm
the day’s submerged in
before the tornado,
before the houses lift
and whirl in the sky,
emptying their dressers
of bobby pins and parts
of toy racetracks.
Later, a news crew
will survey the town,
saying, “and that’s
what I call devastation.
…Back to you, Bob,”
as our lot deepens
in the blown out windows
of out-of-service
filling stations.
The mockingbird
refigures, learning
to live forever
in the blue field,
laughing and flying
into the laughter
that is so near
the heart of pain
its silence
is a blue hum,
the ringing note
inside grief
that will make our town rise.
*Photo courtesy marchorowitz.