After he vaporized the pleasure gardens, The temples of Luck and Mirrors, the striped Tents of the fortune-tellers, After he rained down sulfur On the turquoise bathes, the peacock market, The street of painted boys, Obliterated the city, with all its people, Down to the last stray cat and curious stink, He missed them. Killing them Made him want to kill them again –
How cleverly they escaped him, Hiding in the corners and laughing Just out of sight!
Being God, he wouldn’t permit himself regrets. There would be other cities, just as wicked. But none like Sodom, none like Gomorrah. Probably He has been angry ever since – Angry and lonely.
Just as others have said about this poem, it is a splendid synecdoche for all of God's doings, and the strength of Humanity to escape, hide and mock God. But can we escape, hide and mock God with impunity? Are we that clever, just out of sight?
"Technological and enlightened man, however, seems to flatter himself more than any man before him that he has the universe to himself and that an experimentally inclined God, very much made in man's image, is glad to step aside for him."