Tornadoes - Bill Denham

[Larry Robinson]

Tornadoes
 
Not all tornadoes
            rip--ravage wide swaths
            across grasslands, the flat prairies
            nor deep into the wet pungent air
            of old plantation country.       
            No! No Joplin nor Tuscaloosa, here.
            These drop,
            bomb-like
            from the
            turbulent
            skies of
            my mind,
            dip down
            randomly
            here and
            there and
            lay waste
            to all I
            have
            made
            for my
            self
            over
            the
            years—
            those sturdy structures, carefully placed,
            laboriously raised across the landscape of my soul—
            my sanctuaries, my havens—
            the places where I go to know
            the peace of self acceptance.
            Gone, now!
 
And when those turbulent skies have cleared,
            I stand amidst the ruin and the rubble
            and I look up and I find distant points of light
            that tell me where I am
            and I know, then,
            I will build again
            a place for myself.

	- Bill Denham