You see, sooner or later, everything falters
into radiance. The smallest components of our pent-up
contingencies ignite. Energy shimmers in every cell.
This afternoon, for example, from the balcony
of my condo, in which I have lived exactly
three years, and which overlooks the liner-blue water
of the complex pool, I watched a boy dive.
It was half past noon. I’ d been left waiting for someone
to arrive. And though this has always been the case,
I felt no hurry as the boy’s body marked time,
a clock hand hiccupping again into motion.
After a long dormancy, there is often a mechanical gasp,
followed by a faint smell of smoke because dust kindles
under the grinding gears. But I was not burning exactly.
As I said, I was only waiting, which, let’s face it,
is a kind of fire, but smaller. One rule of nuclear physics:
in collapse there is light. Energy, like a rejected lover,
has to go somewhere. To stay is an impossibility.
The water will ripple no matter how precisely
you enter it, no matter how you climb the ladder,
as when the boy hoisted himself out,
detonating waves that could not find him.