The Tempest

While lightning scores the earth about me,
While thunder crashes, cracks, and rolls,
While water pounds the earth about me
Into seething, slithering holes,

While winds whip tree, protesting, creaking,
Tearing them up by the roots,
While storm-lashed stones begin to topple,
Smashed as if by giant boots,

My hair is clutched by stormy tempest,
Used to smother, choke, and blind me;
My breath is snatched with awesome force
Into the gusts that seek to throw me.

As I struggle yet against it,
To live beyond each crushing blow,
The darkness crushes me within it,
'Til I yearn for lightning's glow.

I cannot start to catch my breath here,
I cannot see, I cannot stand,
I cannot keep my hair from whipping
In the gale that stays my hands

Until the uncaged lightning strikes me
And power follows in its path --
I can command the storm about me --
I look about me and I laugh.

Summer 1993