aftermath

Best I can tell, the events of September 11, 2001 knocked our collective breaths out and we came to either dazed or averting our eyes, and we now cower, a decade later, in a dank cave of superstition as we recoil from senseless hellfire and dire urgent action.

dying static hum

Thunder rumbles through the house shaking loose windows
the back door slams open and Louis C.K. is slammed down
into a ring-shaped dampening field in a desert night.

A lanky trickster glides out of the shadows
and strokes the cylinder until it rings pure
in the tones of observance the comic twitches.

A swarm of fairy folk swirl overhead,
in its wake orbs dance and fall and merge
lullabies and dusty magic explode
into a nebulous secret message
the comic pounds silently on his cell

The trickster addresses the audience,
“You know what the comedian’s fear is”
“Hecklers!” shout the audience, “writer’s block!”
“No…” says the expressionless host,
“it’s playing to a dead room.”