Shelter From The Storm

I’ve put these same words together
more times than I can count,
searching for some way to have them say
the storm itself,
the sense of grey surrounding
swirling lightning water swept across
pinpricked flesh alive again
in a sudden sky coldly powerful,
majestic enough to warrant marvel
and remind us that air, too, carries waves,
makes its own light and applauds itself
in standing ovations that shake the world
and rattle my dusty window,
a thin veneer of words wearing thinner,
time - quick! - to wash the feet
of a weary rain animal and rejoice
in the reciprocity of simple action.

An old woman I met in a story long ago
told me that, if you really listen,
you can hear the thunderous sincerity
of summer storms and sense in that
something more, something of yourself
out there, something of the storm in here.

So I sit, each time the clouds gather,
chin raised and arms wide open to form
a new word I will never be able to write,
entirely awash in such a happy thought.

TRACE

Hurricane

Jeremy Loops