The Ashen Fallen Of Pompeii.......... Poem by John Tansey

I called you again, this morning

So that I might rise, hopeful,
as the sun, splashing,

Onto the tinted towns
and the bright vows of cities,

White-washed for new Fall semesters.

It is this anticipation;

This concusion of air;
a draft that draws us close

that says something good is approaching,
allowing me to jump, headlong, into the foam

and, coming up with a fish in my mouth,

Toss it back into the night, no the falling ash...

That seeps, like syrup, into our mouths,
smothering our moaning, limb-locked lust

and buries the world where it lay,
like the ashen falen of Pompeii

Who, in all one can ask,
was in the exhultation of life as they died...

John Tansey 8/24/04