Sodom

When I was an airdale at NAS Miramar in 1967, there were terrible fires all over Southern California. I was touched by their tragedy and inevitability. So I wrote a poem. Reviewing it, it could be every bit as relevant today as then. You judge:

SODOM

There is a fire in the mountains.
The desert is covered with a black fog.
A roaring crackling snarling thing
that devours its way through the lushness of green-brown,
burning and burning,
choking the air with cinders and sparks.
Sagebrush afire,
vermin fleeing,
whole towns gutted,
rag-dolls and mansions,
horses and fallow hay,
all burned,
blister and char.
People standing and praying,
horns blasting.
Firefighters with watery weary eyes

and hard soot-smeared faces,
and big shovels,
hearing the screams in the moment,
and for an eternity of moments.
A whole countryside burning
under clear skies with blood on the sun;
and the creatures struggling in the hellish haze,
watching toil turn to ash,
raise their collective eyes to the dark clouds above;
fire clouds,
and beyond,
and they see nothing;
no rain,
no golden thrones.

Glenn Buttkus 1967