IN THE WIND

Voices whisper in the empty spaces between winter tree trunks

            and above un-leaved branches.

Voices shout in canyons between glass and steel towers

            and along alleys carved out of brick walls.

Voices throw their breath across ocean waves

            and into subterranean caverns.

Audiences flit in and out among the murmurs and the oratory.

They hear odd reverberations and flutter in response.

Their backs bend against the force of the speaker,

Braced for percussive gusts and winds

That sound out a brief space of time,

Tumble dead leaves, and whistle around corners.

Pine needles fan out-- jostle the ones alongside,

Catching the resonance with their nimble fingers,

Strumming along with thin air

In a flight of fancy on a clear day,

While vine stalks sway back and forth as if there is a rhythm

In the ebb and flow of an invisible tide,

Deep and shallow breaths are cast off,

Like water from the shake of long, wet hair--

Like discarded old clothes, thin and ragged.

Twigs fall to the ground; tin cans skip down the street;

Waves carry away the sand; and caverns echo

The sough of the wind.

© cmheuer, 2016