Not what I’d call a shower, exactly,
but I did number twenty two of them,
within one – past-midnight – hour, the velvet vault
part-obscured by a veil of drifting cloud, only a couple
of stars from the Dipper’s handle lifting above the wispy gray.
Twenty two sudden, silent streaks, first here, then over there,
bright, momentary scars across the face of the high firmament,
equaling in number, I suppose, those golden orbs seen earlier
beribboned round the neck of a star of our own making
in the Olympic pool at Rio de Janiero.
Islanded in Maine, I tilt my swivel chair far back on our front deck,
scan familiar constellations across the bay to the north east,
and consider, at age eighty one, the meteoric nature of reality.
“All flesh is grass…” the prophet warned us centuries ago.
Tonight all flesh is dust traversing space, transformed,
in its swift passing, into rare, revealing light.
