storm motions

The day measured in sky and wind comes to dusk, and the storm arrives, its bags tossed in the night. Now the roof is a ruckus, the trees all a riot, and the clouds clique up in gust and stir below peekaboo planets and one off stars. Leaves and needles dance with the dust as shingles fly and gates gnash their teeth. Inside there is light and there is warmth, the whole hand of shelter here if you’re not too picky or precious. I’m all cough and ache and worn through words. Hunched over, staring at shoe and carpet I keep time. I wait leaning against the sharp shocks and dull groans, listening for the rain. This salacious pace of eyes touching objects, waiting for the big reveal. Rooms without much room, and sober dry-eyed dreams.

The hours creep around the house like they’re prowling for a peep. Like there was something to see in the mundane markings and factory glass. There is no beauty, only threadbare love, and precious little treasure. As soulless as a golem, as plaintive as a wolf, this shambles shifts and fumes. A cup in the gutter, a blemish on the lens. An abandoned lighthouse and the copious swearing of the ocean. Flecks of foam and glistening things scrambling back to the shelter of the sea. I brush my teeth and spit in the sink. Outside the wind takes flight.

It’s the shave and shower ritual, then to my restless bed. The rain isn’t due till the morning, and I’m all out of smoke. I’ll likely be lying awake when the storm arrives, listening to random music and mumbling careless nothings to the ceiling. Like a mirror in the dark, like the song on pause, there is a purpose I cannot capture, a worth I can never know. Unknowing and alone, I’ll chew my wishes and swallow my regrets. In the dark going through storm motions like any other disposable convenience, tossed about like trash.