Calamity The Way I Think It
       

The radio is a brown jug
puffing world news over my shoulder.

I will hear it before I feel it; sooner
or later, a tornado will come

for everyone who knows
my love language is non sequiturs.

Everyone to the tub, where I shower
with my houseplants,

clog the drain & drown the burro's tail.
Everyone in the ditch,

cover your heads. I would be a dolphin
before even a benign shark.

You in the crawlspace, I am listening.
I am in bed developing safety

rituals with rose & cedar candles.
I hand crank my radio beyond

its lethargic batteries. Oh, Most National
Weather Service, be with them—

the lover who knows I hate cooking
for myself, who knows I get marooned

at the counter by a bag of lentils,
who knows, unattended, I only eat

Cheerios in pink yogurt.
The cousin with a therapy cat.

The friend with snowflake tattoos
on her neck. The parents.

Everyone in the basement with flash-
lights & important papers, everyone

lodged beneath the overpass
I am all ears & yours through the sirens

but I am certain it will end, sooner
or later, with me saying nothing to no one.

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Copyright © 2011 Elizabeth Breese All rights reserved
from The Lonely-Wilds
The Kent State University Press
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission