tornado watch 1963.

this, is where Grandma pointed.

A spot on the orange butterfly wallpaper

where Papa splattered; his Tip Top

cigarette papers and the tin

of his half full Prince Albert

crimp cut, the last thing he held.

"Their Gods ridiculous and themselves

past shame" Milton wrote. Because

as you grow older

spots on walls can transform themselves

like little children getting over the

measles. Is there any greater

scatter of chickens into their

wire house than wind? Longer this

time than normal but their little

thin asses taking  position.

I'm grown now to compare the

diaphysis and epiphysis of all things:

The Blackened spirit that brings forth life.

The end of sorrow. How hippie and

with such impractical sadness the explanation

of the locomotive is. "This is where the

kitchen was. And in this spot, right here

next to the overturned cow, was where we

took our meals for 43 years". Even in

the hollow dark, the sadness wore on.

Reviews

[m.s.early]

You have captured the essence of nature and I know I'm not going to explain the depth of my thought (I'm a terrible reviewer).

Essence of nature? man vs. nature? nature vs. man?

The capacity of the human heart to love through loss, the inability of nature to care. Nature's unforgiving and terrible authority to provide it's incomprehensible enforcement of balance (our expense in horrid disregard). The immediateness of the human heart to feel.

The latter being what your write here demands. That we feel immediately. You force us to see what is impossible to capture in a newscast of the same event.

This to me is what poetry does for us... delves us deeper into our human condition through the imagination of the author vicariously. Love is the author of all emotions. We would not recognize hate if it weren't for the existence of love. We are born in love. Love births our hatred for death, our resentment for loss.

With each stem of shredded tobacco fallen below the butterfly pattern, there is a shred of love remembered. A shred of love enveloped by fond memories. That is the human element... shreds of love enveloped by memory and here you present it in its eternity.

[Cory Barrett]

ya know, i have seen a dozen tornadoes in my lifetime. We never really find them; well maybe the chasers do. But, the rest of us, we are are all simply the found. Memory is a twisted beast, a meeting of fronts both cold and hot; always relentless.

[Cory Barrett]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x8hdSF7OzEY

i haven't even read your poem yet (but i will).

i have to post this video simply based on the title (and the 5 beers).

i don't know the music you enjoy.... but this is one that i do.

its a long video, but i think worth it.

[jacob erin-cilberto]

the sadness of devastation...how tornadoes move things around, and create such havoc...yet people grow old and that is devastating because things are in a different place for them...mostly because they can't remember were that original spot on the wall was.

tornadoes in our brains as we age...we are with tornado watches all over the place tonight...

this moved my mind around.

jacob

[wordman]

sounds like memories of the old home place
there's no place like home