Wind
threw the pot of aloe from the balcony.
Bone yellow with a crackle glaze:
I was sitting close, I saw it teeter
on the railing,
the iron swaying—
There are so many plants.
On slender, ringed necks
the old palms whipped up and down,
and shone, and broke
on the wind.
The squat ones nodded.
I was wearing my hat, above me
the sky was a lake of blue fire.
Volts of cream
came swirling off
the mountains, rushed across it,
and, twisting, tore apart.
I was walking up into the foothills,
I walked and walked. The day changed
in its sad, orange way.
I was unfree as the flowering pear trees,
unfree as the brown-cap birds tearing
the petals from their branches,
gobbling mouthfuls
of softness—
Warm rocks at my back,
valley in front of me. Oh valley
dark in the shadow, and dark in the light.
The sky moved crying
through your walls.
Copyright © 2018 Noah Warren. Used with permission of the author. This poem originally appeared in The Southern Review, Winter 2018.