JULIA LATTIMER
★ ★ ★ ★
POETRY
Forgetting Hurricane Matthew
The storm will bury us under its red
and blinking creep toward Lego homes.
On monitors we plan ahead for water,
and grocery carts clank against themselves.
Fluorescent panic empties out the store.
Mothers staple plywood up against
the glass to cork the path of flying shards.
Like darts we’re pinned and looking at the sky, until
rain bites our legs and beats them red
and smears our hardwoods black without the lights.
Until wind cuts rooftops off our homes like hair
and throws them onto lawns to break our friends.
We’ll forget the flash of bone and blood
when morning paints us
still and shining, like caught fish that have stopped flailing.
We’ll charge our phones and lay to rest
the houses at the bottom of the lake.
Julia Lattimer is a poet living in Virginia. She is the Editor-in-Chief of The Woove and the Poetry Editor for The Silhouette. She will be graduating with a B.A. in Creative Writing from Virginia Tech in the Spring. Her poetry can be found in print and online.
