On Tuesday, there was an extraordinary number
of lightning strikes. 24,453, according to our local
meteorologist. That’s a whole lot of flash-to-bang
calculations. Approximately 16.98 strikes per minute
over the course of the day. A manual count is considered
inaccurate and prone to error, but there are radiowave
and satellite sensors. I saw the maps they produced:
the carpet of stylized zap lines, like the chest emblems of
Shazam and Captain Marvel. All the way from Tappahannock
and Chincoteague down to Williamsburg, Hampton, Norfolk,
Franklin, Ahoskie, and Elizabeth City— Bolts as tightly
overlapping as the keratin scales of the pangolin, one of
the world’s most heavily trafficked wild mammals, thought
to be the source of the coronavirus. And yet, for all
the tightness of this armor, the sense that the smallest
gap is all it takes to electrify the entire field.
Purveyors of fine poetry since 2003.
