The Languorous Flipside of Fire
       

It is morning, and you're across the room
in the glider-rocker you love, black coffee
and an I-Pad full of news. You tell me
scientists have discovered the blackest thing
known: a fish that soaks up light, like a
black hole without the star-swallowing bit.
We might call it true-blue black without irony,
without all the luggage of our invented black,
a mix of reds and greens stirred into
a concentrated soup, the black of gas masks
and body armor in Portland to tame the protests,
nothing essential like gunk dredged up
from a pond, or this fish. It starts raining, hard.
And what is rain but the languorous flipside
of fire. Puddles splash according to
laws of physics, the streets turn into rapids
rushing straight to the storm sewer.
You pour a second cup. A beautiful color,
black, my artist friend said in Truchas.
The undersides of leaves as the sun slides
to a lower angle in August, dark side
of the moon, black gesso, the extra-dimensional
ardor of dark matter. How it burns.

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Copyright © 2022 John Minczeski All rights reserved
from Kestrel
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission