and the moon once it stopped was sleeping
in the cold blue light and the moon while the wind snapped
vinyl siding apart slipped around corners whipped the neighbors'
carefully patterned bunchgrass our snow-filled vegetable boxes
the house unjoining the moon our yard strips covered with
hollow shells of hard remnants ice and my son's breath
contiguous static a shard of green light on the monitor
wavers with coughs the Baptist church in Catawba
the only place lit up down the mountain past midnight, someone
waving their hands at something so quiet you can hear
the wind tear at the houses you can hear the neighbor
coming home though he's .18 acres away it's too late
for that feeling (possibility) the night always held
the wind is at it again cracking
paint on the walls one day it will unroot us
one day the wind will tally our losses
but not yet the moon not yet
Copyright © 2011 by Erika Meitner. Used with permission of the author.