Face the Day

17 August 2025

https://poems.culturing.net/2025/08/face-the-day/

When day came, it was not the day
of the casual sun, not the standard
planetary flyby by which a comet
enters orbit. Instead, it erupted
Vesuvian, belching magnificence, power, and dread.
Now old memories, the people of Pompeii
no longer move or breathe, old habits
frozen forever in their final moments. What day
is this, and who worships it? And yet who dares
not to worship such power? The gods come again,
roused from slumber by hope, and their terrible,
awesome day spins the earth on its axis,
reminding the people to pray, and yet
taunting them, laughing as lives fall apart.
Yet I know these gods well, know to trust them
as far as it goes. But where does it go?
Oh, it goes sideways more often than not.
Do we dream to make this world better
or just to escape it? Then I say, let day come,
the fullness of day, every hour and all the minutia.
But if we dream just to escape into dreams,
I say let me keep my eyes wide open,
to face the day and to see the calamity firsthand.