Unfavorable Weather Over the Bay
All week the wind pushed rough water
up over the bulkhead, wave on wave
as far as you could see to the other
side of the bay. Buffleheads and gulls, unfazed,
bobbed up and down like surfers calmly waiting
for the perfect ride, disappearing,
reappearing. A week of alternating
rain and sleet, then a brief clearing
just in time for one riotous sunset.
Overnight the wind did its best
to blow the house down; the sudden onset
of a wintery squall was the final test,
splatting windows with wet snow that obscured
the bay, then froze on power lines, knocking
out traffic lights along the Boulevard –
but it was our boiler’s failure that finally sent us packing
back to the city, the car’s heat cranked full blast,
wipers going like the dickens, the boys
asleep in the back seat, and you driving fast
as if we could somehow outrun this winter malaise.
Brooke Wiese
Brooke Wiese’s work has appeared most recently in Snakeskin, Persimmon Tree, The Orchards, The Road Not Taken, Voices and Visions Journal, New Lyre, and Spoon River Poetry Review. Her second chapbook, Memento Mori, is available from Finishing Line Press, and a third, Allen Ginsberg is a Mensch, is now out from Bottlecap Press. After a very long hiatus, she has been writing furiously again. Brooke lives with her wife and sons in New York City and currently teaches at a special education inclusion school in Manhattan to high school students of all abilities. www.mbrookewiese.net
