Poem for Saturday, September 27, 2014

Deluge

I.

A white car struggles forward with sweet
caution, then a red, like infant herring testing
the Atlantic currents. Where are you
going in this weather, I want to ask them all.
A deluge like this has been known to drown
lesser things; even the highest trees are
only so high

II.

when the wind is this vicious, ready to strip
us of our skin, do not go outside except
for bread or for love. Do you need anything
else to keep you alive, I want to ask
them

III.

the advantage that rain has over us is simple:
we cannot detect from where exactly it is
falling. All clouds converge into a new concept:
gray. A histrionic pause, then thunder is born,
then the drops speed up, then we are struck
with daggers

IV.

when we were children, we played in puddles
that collected where the earth sloped down,
where the contours of its surface gave in to our
weight. This is how we learned our world is
askew

V.

the cars slice through the post-storm thinness.
Somewhere in the night, a man is pulling up to a
house and turning off the headlights that kept him
alive. Somewhere in the night, a new river has
emerged; that which it takes was never ours
to decide.