Wordful Wednesday//"My Century"

For this Wordful Wednesday, I've picked Alan Feldman's poem, "My Century." 

The poem throughout talks about the atomic bomb and how it relates to the narrator (as well as everyone else), with a powerful intro:

The year I was born the atomic bomb went off.
Here I'd just begun, and someone
found the switch to turn off the world.

The ultimate reason I chose this poem, and especially this excerpt, was because of how beautifully it is worded. The needlework image given is something that jolted me; it was unexpected, but I could understand the author's vision perfectly. It was like an epiphany. (Don't you love those moments in literature?) Another thing that really made me love this excerpt was that the line says "perfect blue skin"--not sky. I had to reread that a few times to make sure I wasn't going crazy, but I loved it!

The heavens
remained pure, except for little white slits
on the perfect blue skin that planes cut
in the icy upper air, like needles sewing.

You can read the full poem for free over at Poetry Foundation.

If you end up reading the full poem, let me know your thoughts on it. 

From just the two excerpts in this post, what is your reaction to the poem?