Basia Wilson

Basia Wilson is a poet. She holds a BA in English with a concentration in creative writing from Temple University. Her work has been published in Voicemail Poems, bedfellows magazine and Platform Review, where she currently serves as associate poetry editor. Selected for Moving Words, an ARTS by the People project, Basia’s work will be adapted for animation in an international collaboration between writers, animators and filmmakers in 2023.

Lightning Lessons

lightning and its nitrogenis 	good for tomatoes and tigerlilies but also splits		         homes and tree 	trunks
as a kid knowing	this I lay crumpledbetween the pointless 		bodies of my parents
watching 	the windownot watching the 	window(I still 		              don’t watch the window)
I didn’t need 		               to see to knowthe sky was being swallowed
I didn’t need to see 		                   to knowthat lightning 		               infiltrates lives 	and decides 		
the fate of powerlines and roofs in electric roundsof eenie meenie 	miney moe
lightning teaches lessons on being small
slashes 		open the under-	belly of our 	ambitions 	               makesrevisions
when thunder rattled my dogtags clattering		         body resistingthe breakable embrace of my 		                       arms
I would offer no words 		           I openedthe closet door and made 		                     space for ourtrembling—

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Basia Wilson

Lightning Lessons

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