On a breathless day when nothing stirred

an oak released its deep grip on the earth

lashed the air as it tried a different hold

sliced through the house crushed the car

drove limbs seven feet into the ground and

some how, no one was hurt, yet elsewhere

too much rain turned a mountain to mud

so it roiled through a town where people

slept and buried them in their beds.

For the stillbirth, tsunami and this type of

cancer there is no cure, hence the gamble

for those lacking the oven mitts of religion

who shape their understanding of the Holy

on what they observe in Nature, especially

the tenderness of Spring is perilous, as high

winds and the careen of tectonic plates are

Nature’s too, so bowing the head to that god

requires a fealty of fear and kneeling serves

only to still the clamor of knocking knees.

© Dana Hughes 4.19.20