Martha Stewart Claims She Has Been Struck

By Lightning Three Times



Some people attract electrical things.

Martha Stewart



The first time I was in the kitchen washing

dishes when it sizzled into my stomach

with a single silver stroke. The lightning

flower still blooms faintly from my navel.



The next time it hit, I was watching the storm

gaining strength as it rolled in, centering

itself over my home. I was on the telephone;

my teeth played like the keys of a xylophone.



Finally, adjusting chairs in the garden, the spring

day giving way to an evening shower, I was racing

against the thunder. This time the electric fire

blazed through my feet to the ground.



Now my body burns hotter than the sun, a question

of impossible physics: how can this skin remain

intact, containing molten tissue without a rapid

evaporation of its organs, its muscles? Everything

has changed now, my hands no longer my most

trusted tools: muffin batter bakes within my glowing

palms on the way to the oven; leaf wreathes explode

into flames, scorching the lace runner on my dining table.

My body burns through my clothes, smoke escaping

from every loose-stitched seam.