Hurricane Sandy 2012

 

 

Hurricane Sandy 2012

Late last October the winds came up, way up; blew in at one hundred and ten mph.

A hard storm curled its way along the coast, bellowed its tantrum into your island,

ripping trees, pitching them into houses, crushing cars.  The tide surged in

and in, until the sea sucked the bones of the land and spit out death.  Then, the waves

tried to bury what they’d done with sand and debris and seaweed, tried to cover the windows.

 

And after, days into weeks with your wife and children huddled near the fireplace,

eating fridge leftovers, then mining the canned goods, waiting for the grid to crank up

with civilisation again.   When cold had crept into every last corner, the baby got sick. 

It didn’t feel like camping anymore with the candles burned and clothes covered with vomit

and water getting scarce, yet the damage went on.   “Never seen anything like it,” you said. 

 

Seven months and your chainsaw continues to chew the deadfall into fire wood, now drying

in tidy rows in your yard.  Chunked lengths of black oak lie where the crane dropped them

to your flagstones; they await the teeth of the portable mill.  For you are determined

not to waste these trees fallen after two hundred years of touching the sky; you choose

to honor and remember them.  You want to saw them, plane them, build furniture;

you want to build tables with tales of the wind to tell.

 

The words and photo are copyright © Carol Steel.  This story of Hurricane Sandy is a compilation of stories and is not meant to depict any one family.



Blue

Blue

There is the satisfaction that comes from training hard
and finishing a marathon
and there are the wide blue eyes of pleasure
as a baby discovers the world in his mama's face.

This poem is after Mary Oliver's poem "Yellow" from the book Evidence.  The photo is mine.  If you would like more information about Mary Oliver, click here.

Saucer Magnolia

 

 

Saucer Magnolia

All day each blossom opens
from a bare branch no bigger
than the handle of a teacup,
bursts out of a dark pink bud
and, it has in turn burst
from a fuzzy cocoon, once tight and brown.
Yet, from cups and saucers,
the cream and rose
pour out again and again.












This poem is after Ted Kooser's poem  "Screech Owl" from Delights & Shadows.  The photos are mine.  Words in colour will take you to another website with additional information, if you click on them.

Raccoons

 

 

 

Raccoons

 

A late spring night and the raccoon mama

has come again to the shadows in front of my house

as she has for the past eight years,

with her kits tumbling, wearing their masks.

 

Don't think they are a casual part of my life,

 

these white-ringed tails in the dark.

 

 

(This poem is after Mary Oliver's  "Snowy Egret"  from Evidence.)

 

Words in colour will take you to another website for additional information, if you click on them.

The photo is not mine.  It is used with permission under a creative commons license.  The photo is owned by vladeb and is from vladeb's photostream, which can be found online.



The Leaves in May

The Leaves in May

All at once, the trees wear chartreuse

and the air is plump like dough rising,

yeasty with life, and swollen

with promises of purple,

of violets and lilacs and yes, of wisteria,

that voluptuous vine.

 

Bees, slow and heavy,

like fat-bellied old men

after too many beers,

bump into everything.

They lift and tumble so close,

the hair on your neck bristles

like fur at their buzzing.

 

The air is warm as a snooze.

With glad sighs, we slip into

the untamed seasons

of green.

 

The words and photo are copyright ©Carol Steel.

The Crab-apple Tree in Your Yard

The Crab-apple Tree in Your Yard

Each spring in your yard, a crab-apple tree, two stories tall

unfolds rosy ruffles, spills petals in showers of silk,

soft as your new baby’s skin.  The tree sprinkles a blessing

for those who can see.

 

Yet one morning at five, your neighbour appears

outside in her housecoat, its belt cinched tight,

outside in her yard with not a leaf out of place;

her hands on her hips, she stands under a fresh fall of petals,

a gift from the breeze.

Ah! Glory sifting pink through morning’s slant light.

But her face is pulled into a purse of frowns,

as she glares up at your flowering crab.

 

She sweeps; head down, studying the slate slabs.  She’s battling invasion.

Waging a war, she conquers each petal, every last one.

Heaving a sigh, with her brown slippers and broom,

she retreats to her house, so tidy and beige.  And later,

I hear her leaf-blower blowing, dusting the lawn

again and again.

 

Words and photo are copyright Carol Steel.

 

 

 

A Doe Group Walks the Yard

A Doe Group Walks the Yard

My rhododendrons do not bloom, though they have grown five years in my yard.  They are not as advertised:  “Henry’s Red, a hardy rhododendron with plump buds, and promising fifteen individual flowers to each cluster.”  

The promise has not been kept.  I have not seen one red bloom.  Not one.  The plump buds disappear before any flowers come.  It’s a mystery but I suspect I know the answer.

To test my theory, I sit at my living room window, looking out over the front garden.  There are no interior lights on and nothing except the window screen between me and the rising darkness.  I watch and wait.  The dark throws layers of shadow over the lawn.  I can taste the cool air and hear the robins singing a welcome to the evening.  I am silent, still, waiting.  Shadows stretch and deepen, as charcoal silk spreads over the grass and gardens.

I sense something; movement?  It’s a perception behind my eyes, a knowing, just before my eyes can focus.  Then a ripple of movement; shadow upon shadow on careful, quiet legs.  She stops and looks, searching before leading her family down the hill.  They keep near the edge of the street, travelling mute over the grass.  Their split toes soundless and delicate like a lover’s touch.  Silent, they glide in and out of the deeper shadows cast by the trees and the neighbour’s house. 

Close now, she stops, head up, neck straight, brown ears scoping side to side.  Does she see me, sense me in the window?  I hold my breath; turn to stone.

She decides all is well and brings her two yearlings with her, stepping out of the shadow of the maple, stepping nearer.  Careful, watchful, hungry.   The doe is full, budding ripe herself, soon to birth new life.

I intended to frighten them away but cannot.  I cannot take my eyes from their brown velvet skin, their long lashes, their eyes, round and full and deep.  I watch them bend and nibble; their lips and teeth like a surgeon’s fingers, taking what they want and no more.  What they want are the buds on my rhododendrons.

I should startle them, make a noise, and wave my arms.  If I did, the pregnant mother would straighten and stamp her split hoof, snort a warning and all three would bound away, white tails raised.  I should but I don’t.  Something stops me.  I only sit and watch.  I cannot stop staring.

They step away from the garden and fade, shadows upon shadows as they melt through the yard to another neighbour’s house, to his pond for a drink.  When they are still, I cannot see them even though I know they are there.  They are part of the darkness.  Only in movement are they revealed.

The three deer have gone now, up through the mulch at the edge of the driveway, stopping to snack on the green shoots on the yews, eat bits of new grass.  They cross the street to another yard, searching out other treats before returning to the sheltering woods at the top of the hill.

My mystery is solved. 

I stared into her face.  She stared into mine.  I didn’t move or shout; she didn’t bolt.  In that moment, a kind of blessing passed between us, mute and tender and real.  My rhododendrons have no blooms, but another form of beauty is walking my yard at dusk and dawn.

 

The words and photo are copyright ©Carol Steel.