On the Line: Lightning, Poem, Hell

"You hear a sharp crack, like the sound of a batter hitting a home run, or a low rumble reminiscent of a truck driving down the highway. A distant thunderstorm, alive with lightning, is making itself known."

That is from an Atlantic article by Chris Vagasky, a meteorologist, on lightning.

. . .

"Light me down to the long meadowto where the new snow taps on the fallen snowwith the fingers of the lost tribe.Who would want us to listen?"

That is the opening of a poem by the late writer Jean Valentine (1934-2020) published in The New Yorker last month. A collection of her work, Light Me Down: The New & Collected Poems of Jean Valentine, is due out in early April from Alice James Books.

. . .

"One day, while rehearsing the 'Dies Irae' from Verdi’s Requiem, she grew fixated on the sound of the bass drum, thinking that it was not agitated enough to evoke hell."

That is from a New York Times profile of symphony orchestra conductor Elim Chan written by Javier C. Hernández.