HOW IT WAS WHEN THE COMET CAME
By: Judith Mikesch-McKenzie
As twilight deepens, up and down the street doors begin to open
and figures emerge, struggling with tripods or binoculars and
the straps of cameras strung around their necks.
One by one they trudge up the hill to the spot in front of the blue
house and begin to set up, where the view is unblocked and,
for months now, the ‘Conger Street Astronomical Society’
has met most nights to watch as the bright light makes its way
across their sky. Some make multiple trips, bringing lawn
chairs for children in pajamas, walked up the street holding the
parents’ hands, and everyone settles in, ready for the brightness
to take over the night as the stars come and she emerges. All
the women think of the comet as “she” - glowing bright, flying free,
all beauty and fire. At the first sighting, particularly in the days
before it was visible in daylight, the people all became like a
child holding its first lightning bug, as a hush takes them.
It won’t be back for over two thousand years, neighbor Dan has
reminded them all many times, and It’s bigger than The Great
Comet, y’know - and they do all know this now,
so that as her glow brightens, the whole crowd hushes, and
anyone needing to make a noise moves away, out of respect
for those entranced by her because they know that,
for a few moments, in her light, all the aches of life, of hauling
panels or chasing children will for a time vanish in the light
of her, and people would stand still as dark water,
or become one with their chairs, feeling her star-flight and the
rush of speed, knowing the quiet of the void for as long
as they can bear it, until, in time, one by one, they
head home to put children to bed, and do the dinner
dishes, their eyes fixed out the window on the
deep sky, the darkness the only space where
their soul feels joined to an infinite, free of darkness
liberated in the comet’s transitory radiance.
Judith Mikesch McKenzie has traveled much of the world, but is always drawn to the Rocky Mountains as one place that feeds her soul. She loves change - new places, new people, new challenges, but writing is her home. Her poems have been published in Wild Roof Journal, Halcyone Literary Review, Plainsongs Magazine, Elevation Review, Scribblerus, Cathexis Northwest Press, Meat for Tea Valley Review, and several others. She is a wee bit of an Irish curmudgeon, but her friends seem to like that about her.