the door, the tornado

that was so big it could hold a thousand hearts racing
at the sight of a face they thought would never show up again
beating down the road like a breathless storm or worse,
finding only the wind’s racket forced into a fist
perfectly rapturous and strange how we’re all picked up
and dropped off at some other threshold. fate and chance
met up this way, plucked and flung in the same gust
like a thousand seeds mingling into entirety.
a building blooms from a blueprint and a thousand tests
and still sways past prediction. my cousin’s dad comes across
his cancer so he’s saved like some children will be. and
when grandad catches the tornado before it grows an eye
he sells insurance to neighbors the next day and buries his old
motorcycle with no deathsong. the day dusts over again and over
all the world sweeps a giant broom pushing particles into glorious
knick knacks. a sight too bright to see. my breath held
and nearly dropped. if there is anything deeper than that,
then it is this.

Ellie Sharp is a college student in Portland, Oregon studying comparative literature. They’ve been published by Blue Marble Review, Bitch Media, Deep Overstock, and all the sins. Ellie is also the editor in chief of their college’s literary magazine, Reed College Creative Review. Their writing loves the shoreline, and returns to it endlessly.