​Poetry

Struck by Lightning, Or Not
​by Heather Saunders Estes
Summer evening thunder and rainstorms,
my mother would let my brother and I
sleep on the squeaky porch chaise and canvas cot
under musty camp blankets.
She knew we weren't any more, or less, in danger
outside than in.
 
I could hear thunder coming closer,
and count on my fingers
the seconds from flash to thunder
in an illusion of prediction.
The brilliant flash, crackle and hiss
of a close lightning strike,
then the avalanche of sound.
 
It was good practice early
for facing fear, much later
as I watched my daughter
first drive the car away by herself,
waited for the oncology report,
resigned from my job of 37 years.
 
The rain poured down loud
on the porch roof.
Wind-blown drops were damp on my cheeks.
Flickering lights through my eyelids,
the low passing rumbles of
bowling balls and pins of the gods,
I would still fall asleep.
​
About Heather Saunders Estes
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​Heather Saunders Estes has been writing all her life and recently left her long-term role as a non-profit CEO. Living in San Francisco, many of her poems include fog, politics, justice and family. She walks around the city, tends her bonsai and kale, observes ravens, and maps the best blackberry patches. She has a few poems published and is editing a chapbook.
Other works by Heather in this issue: 
​Scent of Wet Words​ (Poetry - Writers on Writing) 
Rosemary: Shadow of Memory (Visual Arts)
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​The Vistas & Byways Review is the semiannual journal of fiction, nonfiction, poetry and visual arts by members of OLLI at SF State.
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​The Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at San Francisco State University​ provides material support to the Vistas & Byways volunteer staff.