KINGFISH
Thanks again, Chris.
12:10 1 November 1962 (GMT)
43 mi. SSW of Johnston Island
Thor Missile Airburst; 320,000 Ft.
<1000kt
The brute’s truth in those eyes that disappeared
into long walking fires to look death in the face
is now a fact of life. We have photographs.
But proof was not enough, the flash one jump
up on the murdering wind, so children born
to that pose are ghosts of blindness anyway,
we can always pat them back in place, we can
pat them on their heads like cocker spaniels;
until the world goes all white around us,
too, until we wear in the sudden brightness
the peeling look of rendered film.
There is a hairline difference between
shattered atoms and the spirit making waves,
and it walks upright along the cracks.
There is a hairline difference between
a child’s ghost on a nightmare choke chain
and the end of time, and it martyrs itself
continuously. Because that is the difference;
off the clock or on it; between a reason
to live and a reason not to; between who
gets to choose, and who gets to lose:
where there are no more photo opportunities.
Thanks again, Chris.
12:10 1 November 1962 (GMT)
43 mi. SSW of Johnston Island
Thor Missile Airburst; 320,000 Ft.
<1000kt
The brute’s truth in those eyes that disappeared
into long walking fires to look death in the face
is now a fact of life. We have photographs.
But proof was not enough, the flash one jump
up on the murdering wind, so children born
to that pose are ghosts of blindness anyway,
we can always pat them back in place, we can
pat them on their heads like cocker spaniels;
until the world goes all white around us,
too, until we wear in the sudden brightness
the peeling look of rendered film.
There is a hairline difference between
shattered atoms and the spirit making waves,
and it walks upright along the cracks.
There is a hairline difference between
a child’s ghost on a nightmare choke chain
and the end of time, and it martyrs itself
continuously. Because that is the difference;
off the clock or on it; between a reason
to live and a reason not to; between who
gets to choose, and who gets to lose:
where there are no more photo opportunities.