The Art of Hurricanes
All hurricanes are cubist: something seeing, something being
seen. A Picasso eye, splitting the world apart.
The failure was fertile: water gushing into concrete
wombs, water gushing into war zones, water
gushing— The grieving mother refused a coat,
wanting to be as cold as her son, holding herself
together with only dressmakers’ pins. Sodden,
we slogged into complex fog. When we could not
gain egress, we got stuck in Fibonacci loops—
hung the image of the gurgling brook
by the spray of birch and the spume of skunk grass.
Oyster Creek is on alert, the radio strummed.
We were awkward with neighbors who wielded chain saws
with kindness. It’s nothing, they said, when we tried
pushing money into their hands. You played me
more cunningly, Sandy, than almost any other
collapse— funneling my breath, lashing me to your mast.
Protean, the rhyme between intake and exhalation,
between oil slick and scarred linden, as you go now,
in search of new patrons. Almost a human figure already.
Object / Body Of Water
About the Artist
Lissa’s work can be found in the journals Albatross, Sow’s Ear Poetry Journal, andTerrain.org, among others. She is the artistic director of The Rooster Moans Poetry Cooperative, a provider of online workshops. A poet, essayist and critic, she holds an MFA from Stonecoast and an MA from The New School.