By Emily Benson
Wind and rain sweep in over the lake pounding the siding, the porch; the roar of the waves and the crash of thunder rattling the windows. The power of it—the blinding flash of lightning, a crack splitting the sky open white-hot—makes my teeth hum, my hair frizz, my knees weak. We like to play at control: Our timetables, our lists, our passions and distractions, our cities which will fall to waves and whitecaps and salt and battering wind. We are nothing. A moment. We hold time against destruction, oblivion. We breathe in the scent of our children’s hair, we lose ourselves in a kiss, we fall back again and again into the ecstasy and anguish of remembered moments and missed chances and things we wish we’d said or really wish we hadn’t. Then we blink and the shore is closer. The sky is lower. We freeze and we burn and there’s water all around our little islands made of hearts and spreadsheets. Maybe we’ll float away, I don’t know. But here’s my hand, my fingertips reaching out, brushing yours. Look up: A kestrel is flying, navigating the storm.
Emily Benson lives in Western New York with her husband and two sons. Her work has been featured in The CryptoNaturalist podcast, Deep Wild Journal, Gastropoda, Literary Mama, Moist Poetry Journal, Paddler Press, and others. Read more at www.emilybensonpoet.com.
MoonPark Review 