Photo by Priscilla Du Preez via Unsplash:

Aftermath

:

.             The storm hit the house—a car
at 70 miles per hour.

.             I saw the tree in front rush
toward the window
.                           whip it repeatedly:
mad lover, angry husband.

.             Leaves clung to the glass,
branches scraped the paint

.             off the windowsill—
the terrifying gesture
.                           of a drowning man,
when someone else 

.             watches in fascination.
Next morning, the porch 

.             was a massacre scene,
waiting for us to sift
.                           through mounds
of debris and lopped limbs, 

.             to identify, label, and mourn
each find, have it join 

.             its respective body in funeral.
The impatiens pot
.                           was neatly split in two,
a clean cut by a samurai sword. 

.             It had lost all its blooms,
surviving the impact 

.             with stem unharmed.
Down the street,
.                           the old oak
had fallen onto a minivan, 

.             the roof buckling gently
under the burden, but not

.             giving in. It could have been
ours, the minivan,
.                           or that gentle buckle
in front of the storm.

:

First published in Sheila-Na-Gig, Volume 4.1, Fall 2019