I felt the initial force of it
at 3:00 a.m. when a blast hit the front
of the house, sending the windows
rattling. All morning the winds
carved up swaths of air in the sky.
Their force was Magellanic
in magnitude, since what the winds
blew swept over the land, since
the winds roared while blasting away
the clouds, since the winds scrubbed
the trees free of loose branches, since
whatever wasn’t bolted down
was blown, and wreaked, and wasted.
The late February winds
ravaged the landscape and struck down
trees onto homes, as if they were
an extension of the government, a sign
of dystopian devastation, the rolling back
of common sense, environmental policy
run amok, ensuring swaths of barren land.
The late February winds
launched some real howlers, burrowing
through the crowns of trees,
littering the countryside, as does
ignorance and malevolence,
with a savagery of deadfall limbs and,
wherever you look, just like a ravening,
a veritable detritus of little sticks.
