6.0, August 24, 2014

 

6.0, August 24, 2014

The earth wakes us
shaking the bed.
It’s 3:21 a.m.

I sit bolt upright,
the dogs growl,
you clutch my arm.
We, naked
in the dark.

To the ears of this old carpenter
the home we built is
moaning
but not in a painful way
more like the way my body feels
when I stretch after
sitting too long.

After a few seconds: silence.
The planet rests.
“Want to check anything?” you ask.
“No,” I say.
So we curl together and go back to sleep:
you, me, dogs, our little house,
forest, mountain, tectonic plates.

No damage
but a reminder of
who owns this place,
payment due some day
and when it comes
I want to be with you.

 
…..

From my book Foggy Dog
First published in Freshwater
Photo by Zaid Pro on Pixabay
 

Note: Just another night in earthquake country. This one’s epicenter was in Napa, so it had softened by the time it reached La Honda. But ask me about Loma Prieta, 1989…