Charmed Chaos

The night air is oppressive as lightning flashes in the sky
Zeus wreaks havoc tonight, with his angry bolts that strike.
As a vicious storm comes roaring across the arid desert
huge raindrops hit, plopping onto dry as dust earth.
I close my eyes, breath in forgotten scent of fresh rain
As thunder shakes windowpanes, and brings the wind.

Screaming through the trees is the banshee wind
shaking and quaking their limbs against a stormy sky
birds search in vain for relief from pounding rain
fleeing in black twilight as bright lightning strikes
their silhouettes, shadows on a rain soaked earth
but they find no shelter in the storm tossed desert.

There is no haven of rest in this roiling desert
Nowhere are they safe from the powerful wind
there is nothing but the threat of a flooding earth
and the looming black blinding sinister sky,
no place to hide from the impending strikes
nor a dry nest where to rest in the pouring rain.

It seems it will never stop, this drenching rain
as it creates new rivers in washes of the desert
and every brilliant light of another bold strike
seems to feed the maniacal shrieking wind.
A black and white horror movie playing in the sky
for tonight it is Satan’s hell here on earth.

And yet, we persevere in this arid chunk of earth
enduring the long hot months without rain
sending prayers high to a cloudless sapphire sky
Please, have mercy on this dry unyielding desert.
At last our relief comes in a searing blowing wind
for far off on the horizon is an electrical strike.

Zeus throws his bolts of brilliant blue strikes
the heavens open up and drowns the dusty earth.
As the gods come riding in on the harsh wind
they bring a flooding deluge of welcome rain,
No longer dry is this thirsty parched desert
under the imposing black sinister sky.

With a final blinding strike at last comes, prayed-for rain
this torrid earth, and all the creatures surviving the desert
Endure the piercing wind, and welcome the gaping tempestuous sky.

©2021 Linda Lee Lyberg

Author’s Note: A third (and last for a while) sestina for the dVerse Poetry forms-Sestina WHEW!