When you blow from the North,
the mercury shivers,
piling your snow drifts high
before my door;
we skate on roadways
and reclaim our trash cans
blown down the block;
you shift all my shoveling
back to where there is none.
Oh, Michigan wind,
you blow god’s breath,
your roar drowns out
the game on the radio;
you send summer leaves to spinning
and pages to flipping,
blowing the sugar-beet stink
from the cool, humid air,
showering the rooftops
with broken brown sticks,
making the branches above
click like tap shoes
and drop seeds into my glass
of lukewarm beer.
When the silence is set
and the darkness is met
with uncertain regard,
your winds steady the nerve
like a quick shot of whisky
stinging the throat.
I weigh myself down
with concrete resolve
hoping to stay grounded
and not blown around
with the leaves, the trash,
the sound.
Published in FortyOunceBachelors, Vol. 1, Issue 4, September 2011
Published in Collected Poems, 2016
©2011, Dan Schell, Flex Your Head Books