An anger within a calm
thunder clouds against the sidewall
and when the rain came
a frenzy of hyenas
a lightning strike of jackals
the race of gazelles
we breathed the rain through our skin
gulped it down from our hair
sloshed in it until our feet were swimming
house wrens found shelter behind bricks
jaybirds scattered into thick leaves
rock pigeons danced against wind
you can only eat so much
let your arms fall like deadwood
along the flooded gates
| Copyright © 2022 by Michael H. Brownstein Michael H. Brownstein’s volumes of poetry, A Slipknot Into Somewhere Else and How Do We Create Love?, were published by Cholla Needles Press in 2018 & 2019, respectively. |
During the moments of reading this poem, I feel I am paddling about and frolicking in an exotic adventure on earth, and, in after-tremors of reading, I realize that I have been doing so through all my years here. Poem as Orphic ontology!
ReplyDeleteWhat wonderful evocation. One feels the storm, imagines the animals at the door.
ReplyDelete