poem to the earthquake

our August-earthquake has been fodder for creative thought. This is the fourth poem I've written that concerns itself with it.

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The Memory of the Earthquake

It is not just my mind shuddering.

It is the earth also,

shaking in the night

at the memory of the thing

that moved it and changed it

only hours before.

It is an echo moving and remembering

and pulsing through my shins

as the floorboards shimmy themselves

against the house foundation.

The Washington Monument

suffered a crack along the west-side,

and several smaller ones along

the corners and bases. So it is also

sitting, and if the aftershock

reaches that far, it is remembering, too

how quickly the dizziness came to that site.

In 200,000 dollars it will be sound,

ready to move on with its life.

This night I am unsound,

having woken up to the settling down,

and cannot comprehend

the vastness of all this -

the world is always opening up

and making things new,

isn't it?

In the morning I will wake

to find picture frames shifted

slightly out of place, maybe even

a few things fallen off the mantle.

It will be brand-new-ground,

slanted, having surrendered position

where I walk, where I try to listen to the memory

of the quake, fragile,

like everything around.