First Night

The night after that first
hurricane we walked into
yards stacked with lost
trees, wood fences, roof
shingles and somebody's
old lawn chair and it was
dark, so very dark, like
a plug had been pulled
on South Florida and it was
the First Night all over again
before Eve gave Adam the
apple and so black I could see
the Milky Way, the Dipper,
and the Man In the Moon's
grin and so quiet, like Nature was 
humming Hosanna in the Highest,
and I was part of the chosen choir.

Pris Campbell
©2006


Published in Boxcar Poetry Review, 2006

Republished in The Dead Mule in their Christmas Issue.