Here is what light can do.
It travels the distance we agree
equals a sum we cannot conceive
without the aid of something far more abstract,
and in it, we see a rainbow or a god
or a sign or a predictor of mood;
we see plants drink in particles of rays
sometimes nurturing sometimes destroying
the delicate organ of the tree, the grasses
the fruits, the ornamentals

and it illuminates a temple of cut block
the gradual brilliance of time
the stone body of a feathered snake
tail to head its linear journey down
the pyramid stairs, jaws open
for the blood and smoke that fills the night.

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Caroline Malone is a poet and musician who lives in the foothills of the Smoky Mountains of East Tennessee.