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by Tom Brill
It was stuck on
night
The sun groomed her hair
whistling something from "South Pacific"
and murmuring curses as
bobby pins dropped from her grasp
lodging in cracks in the crust
of the earth.
We attached
lightning bugs to bellows
and pumped them to twenty times normal.
World leaders measured the twinkly
creaking of the milky way and
tried to beat rhythms in time
with the galaxy to capture its
pulsing wave.
Scientists tumbled
into Amtraks
scurrying in coach cars across
the midwest toward the nation's capitol
to examine the problem
but after toasting each other's health,
found they could not turn back tonight.
The moon held its
breath
and puffed and glowed
like a neon balloon
Planes carried bags of day
and spilled them into the sky
but it was still stuck on night.
Stars pierced the
darkness far away
forcing their pointy heads in
but unable to reach their arms through
to open up night and make day again.
All the electrical
wires were tied
together on television and
squeezed into a single socket,
and the short circuit lit up
the world for just a moment
then collapsed into night.
Finally they set the
world on fire
and it was day more beautiful
than ever before.
Los Angeles, CA
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