Prismatic Perceptions

Prismatic Perceptions

The sky
blackened with roiling clouds,
slashed with shards of lightening,
heavy with stinging dust-bees.
Would it ever be blue again?
Would the sun ever again rise
to skies not stained blood red?

Ever since that day weeks
(or perhaps, months) ago now,
when the Politician’s words grew full
of fury and unleashed atomic arguments,
it was rare to feel the sun
to see blue overhead.

Crawling through the rubble
from my cave in the old library
up to street level is always an adventure.
I have different routes
Depending on my mood, the time of day--
Day almost being a loose term—
it is always dark, or
mostly so.

I have been sick lately.
The old man says I have radiation poisoning.
I had cancer before The End, radiation treatments
every other week. Now radiation will kill me
before the cancer ever could.


I reach between two chunks of ragged concrete
For a slim, dusty length of metal.
What good is a kaleidoscope without any sun?
The urge too strong to resist, I wipe the lenses clean
with filthy shirt, and lift it to my eye.

Colors swirl, life dances, caught
where no dust can penetrate.
Bits and pieces of colored glass
Fall as gravity defines design.
Vivid blues crest, break against the life-giving greens.

Shocked, I lowered the kaleidoscope
And realize there are blue patches in the sky.



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Kaleidoscope
crawling through the rubble
Emotional


38 lines