Another day dulled by a deadening pall,
a noon as dark as any dusk onset:
gray-brown this filter of the smoky lid,
a sickened yellow shrinking under it;
fires ravenous for days, yet uncontained,
others stuttering immoderate demands.
The blessing is that gum leaves hang so limp,
minimal animation, no wringing hands.
Faintly northward uttering thunder rumbles
clock ticks, tap drips, thought slips, lost inchoate,
then unmistakable, grousing louder,
sustained invective, livid curses spat,
rattle on a tin roof, first one drummer,
then as hard footfall of a vast unrest
or fern forest of drops, each tin pan
blatter crowns imagination.
Oh, but the soak won't be coaxed
(drumsticks put by dry again to suck a
ciggie ember) decking barely splashed.
'Datta, Dayadhvam, Damyata'.
Smoke represses rainfall, vicious bind
only sundered by intensity:
'Signal a dousing deluge by your cracks!' -
but giant's rambled paddocks, making tracks.
Then as afterthought of silence, rain
stop-starts, desists, feather-sprinkles again.
Acrid inhalation, that's for your petrichor
salmon-scale sky, moping gloom at four...
and we, odd troglodytes, dystopian for sure,
connoisseurs of peaty reek, luridity's allure.
.................
