Harsh, unuttered thunder <br />Stood like a stone wall <br />Above the marsh's silver line. <br />Crooked cranes, white as lightning– <br />Flattened for an instant, flashing from the cloud– <br />Came driving toward us; toward us fell <br />The long lines of the shade-laden trees, <br />Soundless slanting thunder: <br />And the snail-like hills <br />Dragged nearer <br />The marsh's slime. <br /> <br />Borne down so <br />By sullen immensities, <br />Two caught children we stood, <br />Waiting the flash, the oblique arm of the parent, <br />Waiting for speech from the jowl <br />Of the irritated horizon…. <br /> <br />Our love began <br />Between flash and crash,– <br />Terror seen and terror heard. <br />See what a cripple our love is! <br />It is sullen; sometimes it makes walls of black laughter; <br />It is fond of words, fond of thick vowels, <br />It mimics thunder. <br />Between us it limps: <br />We wait for it, when we must, faces averted.<br /><br />Genevieve Taggard<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/black-laughter/
