Doña Inez Remembers the Ravages of Hurricane Flora
Virgil Suarez
The way trees snapped like twigs, got uprooted,
slammed against the side of her house. Rattling
bones, she thought with her eyes closed. Leaves
swirled into riddles on her patio, left her secret
messages, huddle into corners. Birds’ nests flew
across the porch, old men’s beards, like her father’s.
She remembers the ravages of weather, time, space.
In the darkness she boiled water for tea, sipped
linden flower tea by the opened door, wind’s crisp
susurrus drying her lips, singing in her ears. What
doesn’t blow you away, she says, roots you like banyan,
like lover’s arms holding her against a hard mattress...
Then a night’s silence, water dripping everywhere,
crickets starting up, tentative at first, then bravado.
In her hands emptiness. In her chest memory flutters,
hands close in on a gardenia bud, its aroma lingering
after this passing storm. This scent of thunder, wet
earth, all her years flashing in front of her, burning.