Saturday, May 21, 2011

Poem: What the Storm Taught Me

The sky was dark like the terror of children  
left alone. Ropes tight
‘round hands—unclenching,
palsied crows-claws
callused as the words
on my tongue,
the salt from my heart.
Fishermen casting our nets ,
becoming the catch

of this man of words
who brought us here.
This man at home with wood
buckling beneath him slept:
as the mast splintered,
as the sail snapped,
as our pleas turned
to wailing, he slept
to wake to the spray
of our accusations, groggy
as if pulled from a conversation.

He spoke to the tempest
as a person.  At once
the sea became a mirror
the sun a torch in a sky
now vacant blue.

In the stillness there existed
a greater dread. We could not bear
to hear this voice
that could command the wind.
What is a leper?  Or a blind man?
Or the raising of the dead? Compared
to a sea that recognizes its creator.
He that spoke light
had returned light to us,
and we longed to throw ourselves
into the darkness,
to hide within the storm.

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