Choir

when we sing that glorious chord, 

we are flashlights

that flicker on

one-by-one, 

then fifty-by-fifty, 

until we all beam 

a quivering 

              yellow-white ray 

onto the sleeping children and 

        the shiny-eyed parents,

revealing 

broken bodies and splintered minds,

our precious light diving 

into the purple-red pool of

cuts and bruises, and bringing up 

drowning boys and women, sputtering and gulping

into the merry, dancing air,

        until our fragile light

flutters 

out of existence.