The Storm

Death
Is all around
I can smell it.
Taste it.
When you open
Your lips to breathe.

The streets are flooded
And the dying
Lie next
To the dead.
We lay in ruins.

Windows broken
On every corner
People wandering
Aimlessly.
Hungry
And tired
In search
Of something to drink.

The sun is beating
Onto the streets
That have become...
Rivers.
So hot
And sweaty.
I wonder
How the young
Will survive
I wonder
If the elderly
Will live
Through this one.

Crumbling houses
And broken levies
Dreams
Washed away
With the storm.
Crumbling artifacts
Pieces of a culture
That is fading.

Thousands of lives
Lost.
Bodies never to
Be found.
Friends I knew
Are gone forever.

Years pass
And the memory
Still does not
Fade.
It is clearer
To me now
Than it was
Muddled in the moment
Wrapped in confusion.
Drowning in desolation.