Wingspread

At Wingspread, the home designed 
by Frank Lloyd Wright 
for Herbert Johnson of Johnson Wax, 
the central dome is lit from above 
by circled rows of clerestory windows. 
Unfortunately, those windows leaked.

Once, during a thunderstorm, 
they dripped on the bald and shining crown 
of Herbert F. Johnson himself 
while he presided at the head of a dinner table 
lined with mayors and members of Congress. 
Herbert F. got Frank Lloyd on the phone 
and barked, What do I do? 
Wright said, Move your chair.

Years later, after the home became 
more or less a public place, 
one of Herbert Johnson’s daughters, 
old and bent in a wheelchair, 
would visit of an afternoon 
just to hear percolations of silence.

              —Racine, Wisconsin