I was coaxed out of a book and onto my front porch tonight, while my thundeshirted dog hid in the darkened bathroom-cum-panic-room. I’d normally sit out 4th of July fireworks, but tonight, I sat on the front step in the dark, feeling neighborhood rumble in all directions, a garbled Morse code of sizzles, whistles, crackles, pops and booms…an occasional blossom of light unfolded above the treetops, baptizing the Earth in petals of fire, and through the smoke veil, a buck moon lunar eclipse shimmered rose gold. Yes, all of that, on my front steps tonight! The longer I sat on my steps, the explosions began to sound less like random noise, and more like an uprising of voices bursting in thunderous anthems and elegiac hymns of freedom, revolution, fury, joy, rage, elation, grief, sorrow, anguish, urgency, defiance, courage…