Leaving Rhode Island: Paper Lanterns

One morning there’s a lantern lit

A paper lantern

Lit by flame

The thing

And the thing that could destroy the thing

Existing inside it

Just centimeters away

I woke up to the lit lantern

Before I woke up to the sun

A flicker of light

Must have crossed my face

It takes very little

To wake me up

One morning I got a phone call

Saying he was coming back

I hung up the phone quietly

I stood there quietly

Trying to process

Trying to understand

What I’d heard

I had made myself some coffee

And the news was up on the computer

This war, that war

Everywhere a war

I hadn’t blown out the lantern yet

Who lit it, I wondered?

Not me

I hadn’t lit any of those lanterns in…

I fill up the tub with paper

Lots and lots of paper

Newspaper

Pages ripped out of books

Tissue paper

Anything I can find

And then I drop the paper lantern in the tub

And wait…

Wait…

Wait…

Finally…

…A spark

The tub crackles, it starts to dance

And I walk out

Out of the bathroom

Out of the house

Away from the thing

And the thing that lives inside it