Our tools compete with the angelic
symbols and the warring instruments
create another mythical monster
destined to swim between the stars.
Storms used to swirl past the antennas
there is no weather between us now,
I’ve met the ocean that you spoke of.
What I found is mostly rain.
Must we live and die by holidays or find relief
in the anxious arms of angels?
I’m in denial but I don’t care.
Only when I look up does it begin to rain.
Rainbows in the puddles of oil,
how gracious can you be
rotating on the axis of principles,
augmented by the rain?
Reciting little elegies in the rain,
our wishes burn up as they enter our world.
M. N. O’Brien received his B.A. from Roanoke College, where his work was published in On Concept’s Edge and received the Charles C. Wise Poetry Award. His work was most recently published in SOFTBLOW and Counterexample Poetics. He currently lives in Lexington, Kentucky, constantly risking absurdity in a Ferlinghetti sentiment, playing old folk vinyl records and studying astrophysics and poetry. He feels awkward writing in the third person.
