Theophany
Like—
Ceiling fans set to high,
Stirring spectral streamers
Or
Searchlights on aluminum trees,
Calling to a round-headed kid….
Or
Charged Earth-pelting particles,
Delighting science teachers.
No.
I can hear Coleridge laugh,
As he did for the man who hurled loose adjectives
At the magnificent, beautiful, sublime waterfall.
I, too, am a spectator made small by the wonder
Trying to domesticate its vastness.
Prone always to say moon is like lantern
Rather than lantern is like moon.
This field, dark and open,
Seems a perfect dome,
So like a planetarium.
I curse these images and myself
For not having a mind fit
To welcome this magnificence,
Aurora, rare visitor to our southern night,
Closest streetlight ten cedared acres away,
But I find, I am the city.
City piled upon city,
Ever increasing weight,
Crushing down to a singularity
So powerful it can pull any cosmic vision
Down to earth.
Perhaps some Keetoowah wanderer,
Finding himself far from the river,
Happened upon this place
On another night of storms in heaven.
The curling shape of Uktena
Warning him that he had strayed
Too far from a world meant for people.
But he would have seen the alien,
Truly seen it.
Turning away in body—yes,
But spirit reaching up to meet the serpent,
A moment to shade and shape all his days.
I envy the gift given to that warrior:
To see a sky he did not believe he owned.
McGregor Cook is a speech coach and voice actor living in Fountain Inn, SC.
