Consciousness, Literature and the Arts
Archive
Volume 11 Number 1, April 2010
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BROWN
I'm writing with a brown pencil
because I'm trapped in Copenhagen
under an ash cloud from Iceland,
a cloud I cannot see from here.
But it's certain, Denmark's a prison.
No one can get out, at least not by plane.
Which is what matters.
The volcano has arrested us
in this part of the distracted globe.
On my walk through the park to this cafe,
a whirl wind erupted in front of me
on the gravel path and soon again dissipated
into budding, brown bushes.
The forces of nature are immense and tiny
and supremely inconvenient. They kill
and destroy economies and make us fall in love.
We are they; we too turn to ashes and so on
in endless cycles we think we trap in notions of time.