A Fresh Round of Tornadoes

Alixandra Krzemien-Cohen

We look to the garden,
seizing the ripest morsels.
We follow the tendrils toward sustenance,
sense the closeness of soil.
 
We are not uprooting, but claiming.
(I pluck a heaving tomato
too heavy for its vine.
I have saved it from certain fate
of fall and senseless rotting.)
 
Our pride is in the bounty.
And in our power over this earth.
 
                          -
 
The radio reports weather for the nation:
“A fresh round of tornadoes.”
 
Now we would pray for fruit already fallen
and sapped unsubstantial, scattered;
pray for no harvest, no pulling up roots.
Place hope in tendrils holding fast
to last until they shrivel.
Now we pray for a stale, burned-out tornado;
we fear the awesome power
of a fresh round.