Too Tall Tom

He almost more than fills the screen,

and, in keeping with all truly great, eccentric weathermen,

makes us just about oblivious

to record lows and outlook. He lunges at the camera, he acts and sounds entirely

unLutheran, he's so enraptured every evening by the weather

you'd think he'd out and out explode.

But he doesn't explode. He grins intensely.

His voice spirals up and down,

pounds growls and grates—he rhymes like a dope,

beams like a saint—

He doesn't explode. He surges to the very brink, it seems,

but then stuffs himself back down

into himself at the last breathless minute,

composes himself

within the designated frame

in time for a message from our sponsor.

So tall, every suit I think is tailored

(though he never holds still

enough to fit himself precisely.)

Oh yeah, and he looks sometimes vaguely like a mobster

with his black shirts and black or burgundy ties. An outrageous, blabby gangster,

who delivers current temperatures

instead of bullets and brutality. It's enough, isn't it?

It's plenty that, by merely standing where he is,

he reveals to us our shrimpy constitution

relative to the sky. He's closer to it, afterall—the sky;

that's maybe why the man's so giddy, as well as godly, as well as criminal:

he's found a way to live up there

while still firmly in the studio, getting paid.

I don't understand it. I want it.

And another thing: he's incredibly kind.

It's like he's passed through exhaustion and irony

and come out on the side of irrepressible bliss. I want it.

He leads donation drives for winter coats;

they arrive in thousands.

He visits schools and teaches children;

they all get A's in hurricanes and dew.