Last night, lightning turned my room into a photobooth.

Thunder rolled down rocks on me

and the floor trembled under my feet

It darkens early in November. In the afternoon's half-light

I half-thought I'd like to go out again about my business

as I did this morning, managing to dodge the worst of the rain.

Yet I stayed inside, listening to the wild wind.

And though the sun gilded the clouds in the watery sky

at the end of my street, I worked on,

attention divided between will-I and won't-I

until it felt too late to go.

Soon, they say, there will be snow.

The day has died, and I am still inside

playing switch-it-on-and-off-again with my lamp

as clouds gather and disperse behind my half-closed blinds.