I’m no storm chaser, but I saw

the quiet where workers turn jobless,

where cyclones undress into hurricanes,

and air breathes between crushed cherry

blossoms inside a tightrope walker’s fist.

Leaning out the window

with a cig and a cup of grapefruit juice

I taste smoke in the wind

carried from wandering oil rigs.

“Looks like rain” my wife said.

It’s looked like rain for weeks,

but not a lick of water has bothered

to whet the petunias hanging on the window.