Too Much is a Poem

too much is not a bruise
that shows off its hidden colours,
then disappears without a trace;

too much is the air heavy with summer’s angst
exploding into a raucous thunderstorm,
darkening the fevered night,
flashes of despair naked against
half-hearted window panes,
the heat on tiptoe to meet the outpouring;

too much is a poem unstruck by lightning,
words bursting from its wretched mouth,
raining down on the burnt,
the ravaged, the waiting;

too much is that poem,
a reborn ocean streaming from its hair,
the riven truth flowing from its lips,
its cry undoing the ancient myth of the sky,
standing alone in the wind,
bare feet in the growing sludge,

too much is that poem
holding out a broken umbrella
to shelter mine.