Seizures
Mark Belair


It first happened
when I was thirteen,
and a short-order cook
threw, onto his hot grill,
a slab of bacon.

It happened again, a few weeks later,
as I walked by the lapping sea.

I soon found
it could happen anywhere, prompted
by a shaft of sunlight, a cool breeze, a gentle rain--
by the commonest things.

It was prompted, in fact,
only by the commonest things.

Mostly it happened when I was alone,
but it could happen around others--
though to look at me they’d never guess.

And even to this day,
when a spell comes on,
I’m too embarrassed
to confess
to these unexpected, overwhelming, achingly
fleeting
seizures of bliss.