Spontaneous Firing, and: A House on the Cliff

Abstract

Spontaneous Firing, and: A House on the Cliff Joel Peckham Jr. (bio) Spontaneous Firing Neuropathy, the doctor says, without expression. The bodyshouting out its false report incessantly. But nothingis really wrong. Like a fire alarm going off becausethe batteries are low. Of course no warning is really false,just late or premature, misheard or heard wrongly. Woodwants to burn and burns and, like a poem, a flamecan leap a long way from its origins. Its logic is its own. Somewhere, someone feels a stabbing in his chest.The breath stops in a crib while parents sleep. Two girlsmake it halfway down the steps, their lungs fullof smoke. Everything burns. And I just feel it. A month ago,down Chellis Road at four in the morning, a house caught fire.It burns still, smolders in the mind's thick peat. If I had notbeen sleeping, I might have seen from my bedroom window, a glowing just beyond the ridge—or maybe heard the shotsthe whole town swears were there amid the pop and blastof glass and falling beams. And maybe they were. For somesay last spring they heard the husband pointed a gun into the air and screamed at the rain—police were called, a warningissued, and then there were the rumors: a troubledmarriage, debt. So when the papers named it "accident,"cause of death, "asphyxia," no one believed. They heard what they heard. And that man was crazy a good friendsays. Anyone could have seen it. Even the ministershakes his head. There has to be a reason. I nod. I knowmore than I'm saying—yes, they're always there—the signs.Like that numbness in your left arm. Is it a pinched nervelike you tell yourself. Or maybe heartburn. Maybe a burning [End Page 57] more distinct. Is it bad wiring in the walls or in the chest?From where and when will the flame leap, the muzzle flash?Our knowledge works only in reverse. Like a poem, likeprophecy. The fire has a logic. And like the body wants to burn. A House on the Cliff At night the ocean shook the cottagelike an angry man will shake the shouldersof a boy, shouting Listen. Listen to me. I've heardit fill me like a sail the way a prophet hearsGod: its harsh refusal to be shut out:a force to be lived with not withstood. There was a house on the cliffside—They fought to save it. First with tiresfilled with stone, poured concrete. Then shovels.Backhoes. Cables at every joist. But one winterstorm spooned out the sand beneath. It slid,in stages, the deck leaning down the dunelike a bather stretching out one long leg to test the water. Then the acrobatic pause—the kitewhen the string snaps or the stunned silencein the stare of the child just stepping offthe curb as the car appears aroundthe corner. The no, not yet clinging onthe diving down and in. I've heard the moanand shriek of nails, crack of wood and glass-shatter. [End Page 58] Still, among the stones and driftwood,sea glass, bones of fish, the remnants whisperin the sand. Broken picture frames,a clock with the face gone—a jewelry box of silt. Joel Peckham Joel Peckham Jr. has published two full-length poetry collections, nightwalking and the heat of what comes (Pecan Grove). His latest chapbook, Movers and Shakers, was recently published by Pudding House Press. His essays and poetry have appeared in many journals, including Black Warrior Review, North American Review, Prairie Schooner, and Southern Review. His poems have also appeared in Contemporary Poetry of New England (UP of New England) and Poets Against the War (Nation P). Copyright © 2011 University of Nebraska Press