Heat Lightning in a Time of Drought by Andrew Hudgins

In Heat Lightning in a Time of Drought, by Andrew Hudgins, repetition is used with the phrase ‘want some’.  It is not specified what ‘some’ means, but it has significant meaning to the drunken neighbor and the writer of the poem.  Repetition is also used throughout the poem, such as “The crickets will not, will not stop.”  There are also repeated words, such as ‘drunk’.  The author references more than one drunken person: the neighbor and the woman with whom he fell in love.   The repetitive words make those sentences in which they are more powerful and draw the eye to them.  They are clearly important due to the repetitive words, or at least the author is trying to bring attention to them.  Another part of the form of the poem is the lack of sentence structure.  The sentences run on and do not end at the lines, instead continuing on to the next line. 

            There are a lot of comparisons throughout the poem.  The chandelier falling and exploding is compared to the rose dipped in liquid nitrogen and being smashed against the desk.  The words that are used to describe the events are very harsh and descriptive, such as the words ‘exploded’, ‘razors’ and ‘snapped’.  It reflects the damage done on both the rose and the woman, which are both beautiful objects in the poem.  The comparison of things snapping and breaking relates to the broken relationship that he had with this girl.  It seems that the girl has left behind pieces in the bed after the salesman shows him the vacuum and uses it on the bed.  There are different cases of drinking throughout the story, both happy and sad.  When he meets the girl, she was “a little drunk, the love-light/unshielded in her eyes”.  However, after his relationship ends with her, he has a “friend who helped me through [his] grief by drinking/all my liquor”.