What does wind think of the camp on North 7th as it moves
under the overpass- bright blue nylon riffled,
work shirts on a rope, the entry flap breathing,
an old man’s head bent over chessboard, a rook tipping over?
What does wind know? Easy to say - nothing,
to say it knows nothing sweeping the day’s trash
down the avenue. The crawl says: fires in the West;
men with AR-15s; a mother and child face-down in the river;
children in cages, says the rise of this, the fall of that.
We say the wind knows nothing as it drives fire like a blowtorch
across the land. We blame the grid - the lineman, the line -
though we know better. We say the rain inside the wind
knows nothing, as mud swallows houses, houses fall to sea,
floods push through cities, the ocean takes back land.
We say wind and rain know nothing. We say there’s nothing
to do. The wind tussles our hair and goes on.
A tarp snaps. A rook tips. The old man uprights it.
The wind takes its turn.
