after dinner on the porch
was the best time, he and grandpa watching,
waiting for the storms--a thunderclap
the sweetest note to both of them

sheets of rain rolled across
the big pasture, downdrafts made the boy shiver,
even cradled in the old man's arms

neither would speak, grandpa's good arm
would point, or wave, these movements a code
between generations, theirs at least

finally a twister appeared in the west
growing plumper as it spun across the fields,
spitting gray dirt from its base, a zigzagging
dancer without a care in the world

grandma and Aunt Helen
fled to the cellar, imploring the pair
to follow

though they didn't, for all their hours
gazing at the heaving heavens would have been
profligate had they hid in the ground,
missing creation's greatest crescendo  

the angry funnel ate a section of fence
wide as a football field, and felled a tree
not a quarter mile from the house--its roots
too shallow, grandpa thought

when the tempest passed, the sun made
an appearance, slipping between the cloud bank
that birthed the tornado, and the silent soil
in the devil's wake

in its final moments,
it glared at the interlopers on the porch,
perchance admonishing them the promise
of its golden rays was no sacred contract
but a fickle gift