Atomic August,
canicular and leonine
spraying a dread of scorching heat
and unpunished low-
pressure clammy storms
ejecting flares on an orange horizon
competing in the sport of curve balls
in hubris-deranged Elysian Fields
No ghost in the machine can stop
Persephone, as resigned, she crosses the portal
to permanently embrace the underworld
Every hundred years or so she eagerly sticks out
a timid ear hoping for the silence of mastiffs
and ventures out her slender foot
to test what degree of depletion
surface destruction has achieved.
Pina Piccolo, 8 August 2024
Cover photo by Susan Aberg.