On the day ...
... Time staggered
All sounds of ...
... fire and fury
Lives ended ...
... brick and glass
The nearby vegetable ...
... erasing memory.
Out of the ...
... radio blared, unscathed
on a commercial ...
... protects them all.
Select any word below to get its definition in the context of the poem. The words are listed in the order in which they appear in the poem.
The Poem Out Loud — Vivimarie VanderPoorten reads "Explosion" aloud.
In Conversation with Vivimarie VanderPoorten — An interview with the poet following the release of her prize-winning collection, Nothing Prepares You.
The Central Bank Bombing — A 1996 Washington Post article about the incident described in "Explosion."
An Overview of the Sri Lankan Civil War — Read about the long and bloody conflict that forms the background for this poem.
Poetic Economies: A Book Review — Read a review of Vivimarie VanderPoorten's 1996 collection, Nothing Prepares You, in which "Explosion" was published.