In the Wake of the Storm

In the Wake of the Storm

by Emily Rose Hazel

Shattered windows that we are,

strangers look through us at the aftermath.

We are the dislocated, out of socket.

Bullied by the wind, knocked down, roots exposed.

We are the stories that go on breathing

after the headlines have exhausted themselves,

the survivors at the end of each obituary.

We are the families evicted by the ocean:

the deep has dragged its bloated belly

over the seawall, over the roads,

and made itself at home in our living rooms.

Our kitchen floors are covered

with its afterthoughts. Our basements

have been emptied of meaning.

Mountains of sand to be moved.

Of what use is faith to us, if it’s not muscled

and doesn’t carry its own shovel? What good is prayer

unless it can clear away all the debris

and show us what we’re standing on?

We are like broken boats

abandoned in the streets. We are the houses

we’ve been anxious to return to,

desperate to reclaim ourselves.

>p>The landscape as we knew it has dissolved.

A slab of what was once the boardwalk—

so many summers—washed up in a driveway.

Still bolted to the wood, a bench

on which we might have eaten ice cream.

Rows of fire-ravaged houses:

twisted metal bedframes, front steps

leading nowhere. A green door, left ajar,

listing on its hinges. Behind it,

the tangled remains—no walls,

just a swamp of blackened bricks.

>Everything is muddy and tastes of salt and ashes.

We wash dishes, clothes, our shivering bodies

with gratitude for clean but frigid water,

trying to contain the bitterness,

stop the infection from spreading.

Our batteries are dying,

our bright white circles of certainty

fading to hazy, amber halos.

In electricity we trust, but now

we’re going back to what has guided generations.

Every match strikes a word of courage

against the dark: a tongue of flame

flares up and licks the wick.

In this blind tunnel of days,

we huddle together, relearn old ways

to connect, trying to forget

how powerless we are. And for a while,

darkness slithers away, hides

in the corners of our minds.

A caravan of strangers

parked along the shoulder of the road,

we wait for hours to fill our empty tanks.

At the church, we stand in yet another line

to be handed rationed supplies:

a bucket and a flimsy sponge mop,

two rolls of toilet paper,

a Ziploc sandwich bag of laundry powder.

We reach into a box of matchbooks,

but there are no more candles to be found.

The days, mere stubs of wax,

burn out quickly now. Night comes early

to claim us. Not even a stoplight

punctuates the run-on sentence of the dark

as far as we can see.

After half-living so long without,

will it seem a strange miracle

when the wires hum with energy again?

Will we dizzy ourselves in celebration,

or simply weep with relief?

The promise of restoration

stale on winter’s breath, we are weary of waiting

for the sun to remember us.

We live on the far end of enough.

Justice does not reach us here. We open our doors

and step into bottomless shadows. We have lost

our eyes. We feel our way along the walls

as if the answers were written in braille.

As if our fingers could read.

Among the strong, we are like the dead.

Our hunger is an angry growl.

Our mourning is a hollow, feathered cry.

We stretch out our hands for deliverance

and it floats away, just beyond our reach.

We cling to each other to keep the ones we love

from being swept away by waves of despair.

God, if you hear us, why are you silent?

Is it because you are listening?

Or is your own throat filled with sand?

Push the waters back to where they belong.

If it’s true you can dry up the sea with a word,

have you misplaced what you meant to say?

If you are with us, how can we know,

when you have pulled down the curtain

and snuffed out all the lights in the sky

so that we cannot even see your silhouette?

Are you too tired to rescue us?

Are your arms too short to save?

We are still waiting for daybreak,

for your mercy to shine on the rest of us

sitting in the dark, sleeping in the shadow of death—

for you to show us, one foot at a time,

how to navigate these ruins

and somehow forge a crooked path to peace.

What do we have left? Splinters of memories,

jars of peanut butter to sustain us,

the generosity of friends. The work to be done

stretches before us like an ocean.

For now, we share what little light we have.

We swaddle babies in blankets.

We climb the stairs in high-rise buildings

to bring meals to aging parents.

We cup one hand around this flicker of hope,

our wavering belief that even now,

help is on its way from somewhere.