THE CORONA

Knife-edge

days and shimmering nights.

Our child watches the shifting sunlight and leaves.

The world shimmers, shimmers.

Smoke goes up the flue,

and spins, unravels in the wind.

Something in me unravels after long thought.

And my mind flares:

as if the sun and moon lock in an eclipse,

and the sun’s corona flares out.

It is a fire

out of gasoline and rags

that makes us take nothing for granted.

And it is love, spontaneous,

flaring,

that makes us feel

like a cougar approaching a doe in labor,

makes us pause and move on.