BOOM

 

The night is soft and warm. The first lightning bug flits across the grass and lands in the crabapple tree. The distant boom of fireworks echos over the field from the town four miles away and I wonder.

What if it wasn’t fireworks? What if every night bombs dropped and fire colored the horizon and billowing smoke blackened the sky and trailed across the moon with a trembling hand? 

What if it was our school, our place of worship, our grocer’s, or our playground? The factory where they make seat belts and car seats and high chairs and swings for toddlers? 

As we celebrate the fourth of July with delight, I wonder, what if it were sirens sounding the alarm to make haste to shelter, a basement or crawl space. 

It won't alway be somewhere else.