“Dorothy and the First Tornado” by Julie Cameron Gray
from the 2017 Poem in Your Pocket Day booklet

The sky is greening, foaming

like the top of a bubbling pot.

And look, see how the clouds

 

climb down to dance with us?

How the animals rush up to meet

them, and conduct the thrashing sounds?

 

The clouds want to circle

on their own, thick rounds

across the fields, growing near.

 

Shingles, rakes, shovels through

the air—so many things

learning to fly, or could they do

 

this all along? Come down

from the sky, you silly cows.

Come back to the barn, blown open.

First printed in Taddle Creek Magazine (issue 34)