Severe Weather Warning (Poetry)

I went late to bed last night, grown tense and fearful that
out of the swirling dark a darker hand
would reach on down and stir the trees about.

Fitful through the smallest hours ran
the thread of winds that tugged me half-awake
then rocked me — hushed and howling low some chilly lullaby —
                                whole choruses went on and on and on...

Outside, did banshees wail and moan? I heard them in the hinterlands
                                of dreaming.
They swam in air, swift as fish in shoals of my imagining
their faces cruel and glinting silver eyes.

And hardly had the grey-haired dawn, skinny-frail
against those phantoms pushed her way
beneath my lids, I knew the day was calm — the trees unhurt
and silence breathed a lungful of relief.