Sign Catalogue, Post 10, Week 10

Picnic, Lightning
Billy Collins

"My very photogenic mother died in a freak accident (picnic, lightning) when I was three."
                                                                                                                                         Lolita


It is possible to be struck by a meteor
or a single-engine plane
while reading in a chair at home.
Safes drop from rooftops
and flatten the odd pedestrian
mostly within the panels of the comics,
but still, we know it is possible,
as well as the flash of summer lightning,
the thermos toppling over,
spilling on the grass.

And we know the message
can be delivered from within.
The heart, no valentine,
decides to quit after lunch,
the power shut off like a switch,
or a tiny dark ship is unmoored
into the flow of the body's rivers,
the brain a monastery,
defenseless on the shore.

This is what I think about
when I shovel compost
into a wheelbarrow,
and when I fill the long flower boxes,
then press into rows
the limp roots of red impatiens--
the instant hand of Death
always ready to burst forth
from the sleeve of his voluminous cloak.

Then the soil is full of marvels,
bits of leaf like flakes off a fresco,
red-brown pine needles, a beetle quick
to burrow back under the loam.
Then the wheelbarrow is a wilder blue,
the clouds a brighter white,

and all I hear is the rasp of the steel edge
against a round stone,
the small plants singing
with lifted faces, and the click
of the sundial
as one hour sweeps into the next.



-Uses a quote at the beginning to set the scene
-implies bloodshed with the toppling, spilling thermos
-likens the circulatory system to electricity
-shoveling compost is a lot like digging a grave, which fits the theme of death
-shows a shift in thought with "then"
-uses alliteration: "bits of leaf like flakes off a fresco"
-ends on a much lighter note than he began