Monsoon Season

I'm lying on the floor listening for
the distant thunder,
sounds like deep songs,
like old friend's voices milling
around the cosmos,
their chairs scraping
in the El Chapultepec bar.

The heat lightning of revelation strobes:
LA, Denver, Albuquerque,
old outposts where flashes of
inspiration became
epic burns and the smoke
tonight
drifts beyond all proportion
under these
black gloved clouds.

memory, not as mellifluous as camaraderie
but I can hear them
there is more than
echoes and ashes dancing in time
to see or feel
or praise. The
changing features of the sky
can alter life and the lightning

so close,
burns holes in their names
as the standing rain fills them
with an unforgettable beauty.