Hot Air

I could feel God all over me as I frantically pedaled
home to tell my mother that neighbor lady was dead.
I never lifted my eyes from the black roof of the house

I visited once to get eggs. She had opened the door
with skeleton hands that shook like her voice,
a breathy whistle between her teeth.

I wasn't sad she was dead, just scared
the air of her spirit would slip free and catch me
in the open space of the field

before God lifted her away in a vacuum of wind.
I wanted Him to burn her house to the ground
so that none of her escaped.

— Kent D. Nielsen