DIVERTIMENTO
There had been no attraction, no surprise
for fifty miles, just crows, Holsteins and stubble,
and now, atop the only local rise,
like an ungatherable
iron flower, this looky-here wind turbine.
Sure, it turns a hair-harassing day
to zaps that, routed eastward, power urban
transit, say,
or crab canneries further up the coast,
but in this yawner of a Bronze-age Now,
among the ruminants, what matters most
is just, like, freaking wow—
Bravissimo for the kinetic sculpture
dangling upward from a snag of earth
while juggling, with acquiescent rapture,
three arms’ worth
of gale-force wind. Oh yeah, I wanna be
that gleam with crazy feelers going round.
Thank you, Ohio, for reminding me
how Art should astound.
—from Rattle #56, Summer 2017
Tribute to Poets with Mental Illness
__________
Aaron Poochigian: “I have lived with mental illness since high school, been institutionalized, undergone experimental treatments. My mental illness has affected my poetry primarily in that, given to periods of lethargy, I am especially grateful, as you will see, for the shock of revelation.” (website)
