songs in the dark

We're sitting at dusk on a hot calm evening around the dinner table,

pasta all gone, stories about the day still being passed around.

Without warning everything goes black and still.

The eerie silence is pierced by a neighbor's loud comment, 

"Brownout!"  

It's brown, not black, because it's only a local power outage, 

as common as water outages are on this slice of the globe.

 Candles are collected,

and Elise washes dishes by their glow

as another neighbor begins to serenade the street with old 80's tunes,

carrying them just a little recklessly.
 But he does it passionately, like a mission of mercy to families robbed
of our evening entertainment through radio and TV.

We bake a batch of cookies by candlelight,

 thankful for our little gas oven,

while Mark collects a few flashlights

so we can play Ticket to Ride by their light,

though I'm sure the fact that I couldn't see the whole board 
is the reason I didn't win.

Even in the dark we're sweltering,

 so when the power surges,
and the blades of the fan begin humming in sweet ministry again,
we cheer along with the rest of the street
in a united celebration of electrical power.

“I am the light of the world. 
Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, 
but will have the light of life.”
John 8:12