The Blue

The Blue

You can have Egypt and Nantucket.
The only place I want to visit
is The Blue,
not the Wild Blue Yonder
that seduces pilots,
but that zone
where the unexpected dwells,
waiting to come out of it
in the shape of bolts.

I want to walk its azure perimeter
where the unanticipated is coiled,
on the mark, ready to spring
into the predicitable homes of earth.

I want to stroll through
the pale indigo light
examining all the accidents
about to rocket into time,
all the forgotten names
about to fly from tongues.

I will scrutinize all
the surprises of the future
and watch the brainstorms
gathering darkly,
ready to hit the heads of inventors
laboring in their crackpot shacks.

A jaded traveler
with an invisible passport,
I am at home with this heaven
of the unforeseen,
waiting for the next whoosh
of sudden departure
when, with no advance warning,
to tiny augery,
the unpredictable
plummets into our lives
from somewhere that looks like sky.


~ Billy Collins ~

Posted over on Panhala