Cornell

I.

Angelic yet shrill, a voice to woo all the lovers

and soothe all the mothers but also a fierce cry

of havoc as teen angst embodied, as adult

confusions and contusions voiced plaintive,

contemplative, and combative. Looking

for Spoonman, resting like a stone, and rowing

all along with the slaves and bulldozers.

Now he’s saying hello 2 heaven, and those

who loved him up close and from afar are

left behind to mourn the loss of a personified

scream married to melody, but also, a father,

a husband, a son, a brother, a bandmate,

an icon. Jesus Christ pose, Jesus Christ-long

hair and goatee, Jesus Christ…

II.

Summer 1997, you stared in black

and white back at me from the cover

of Spin. You and your band, who had

already broken up still as the songs

from Down on the Upside burned bright

on radios, Walkmen, and Discmen

all across the world.

My adolescent brain felt loss yet

I did not know why. Now 20 years

older, my adult heart feels loss

and I know why. You, stranger,

left an indelible and undefinable

mark on me and those like me

like shadows scorched into pavement

after an atomic bomb has gone off, like

the ash-statued remains of Pompei:

both unnatural and primordial in their way.