Dear Helene,

Your repetitive rapid rampant winds
and relentless ruthless remorseless rains
assaulted the Southeast with force
leaving trees, power lines, bodies of water, roads, and inhabitants melancholic
and traumatized!

You disappear tangled in shoulder straps, elastic bra bands, hanger hoops and swaths of fabric.
Hands punch and reach for holes, neck crunches, you try to turtle your way out, searching for the opening, hurtling toward sunshine.

there was no such thing as poetry until a woman
in a field opened her throat to exclaim how
beautiful a bumblebee / was perched on the
webbing between her thumb /

My father and I got into a fight over a kitchen mouse that lived in our bread. He wasn't willing to put a trap out. He said “that’s what the cat is for.” I scoffed at him, "The mouse will be dead either way."

I sit mixed
twiddling in pockets
holes wearing out the cloth.