Swept Away by Ghostly Breezes

You’d have to be featherlight.

Even air’s strong gusts are weak.

The girl ran outside to check on

How the neighbor was doing

Burning brush in wind and rain.

Now, rain—rain can do a lot.

Flash floods sweep off hunks of cliffs,

Houses, hikers near the stream.

What can such a ghostly breeze

Do, such as words whispering?

The here and now, the present,

Writes an essayist on time,

Instantaneously swept

Away by a ghostly breeze.

We’re fascinated by this.

Where does such a breeze come from?

In what sense is it ghostly—

Strange, faint? Instantaneous

How? Ghostly breeze is a name

For change, the effortlessness

Of change, the girl come knocking

At the window, laughingly

Back from the neighbor’s bonfire.

She enters, smelling of smoke.