absorb the rattle

Not a Poem

This is not a metaphor:

I am ready for the storm.

My chin on the window sill.

Dust and webs. A dead hornet—

Crispy carcass teetering

On air-condition drafts.

From dark clouds a darker one

Descends. That is not symbol,

Not figure. That’s tornado.

I am ready. Dust and webs—

A sneeze.

The hornet flies—tick, tick, tick—

Quick against the purpled pane.

A literal twist of air,

Itself a grand simile

Likened unto the tempest

Of jealous love, or unto

Worry,

Loosely wound fingers around

The old, proverbial neck.

The window rattles. I lean

My nose to the glass, turn cheek

To cheek, absorb the rattle

To my very bones. The storm

Goes by.

I watch the cloud unravel,

Ascend, rejoin the massive

Continent of gloom, and wait

For hail—the racket of ice,

The real shards of angry skies.