LIGHTNING

We occupy dimly lit rooms,
our movements restricted
by what we do and do not know.

What we see, we believe we see clearly,
wholly unaware of what waits in the corners
into which we do not peer.
Perhaps we would rather not know what is there.

Outside the window, a flash of lightning.
For an instant, the whole room is illuminated.
What we knew disappears in the same light
by which the unknown becomes known.

The room has not changed. Nothing has moved.
Only the darkness that allowed us to know it wrongly.

And now we know
what was always there.