Nocturnal Sheet Lightning Written In The Style Of F.I. Tyutchev Poem by Ron Lane

NOCTURNAL SHEET LIGHTNING WRITTEN IN THE STYLE OF F.I. TYUTCHEV (1803-73)

After a day of humid heat and sultry expectation
night has come and Earth gives fever to the sky.
Not a breath of air. And Earth’s anticipation
is growing. Nothing – not a leaf or fly
is stirring. Clouds hang thick with threat and silent
malice everywhere, and heat that warns of violent
evil. Now the trembling Earth awaits the jagged dagger,

which does not come. Like gods that swagger
and play with Nature, so the first faint flash creates
a thrill in Earth’s expectant veins. A distant flicker mates
with that. Now other flashes far and wide
have joined the game on every side,
frequent, faster, frantic, all around,
making snapshots of the ground.
Blinding lightning cleaves asunder
pregnant clouds. But still no rain, no thunder.

The lightning’s passing. Soon the flashes dim
and flee to far-flung corners of Earth’s rim
and send their signals back and forth,
from east to west and south to north –
a universal language, cosmic semaphore,
as from a far-flung, isolated shore,
like deaf-mute demons deep in conversation.

(2010)