qarrtsiluni

by Alex Cigale

Thunder, thunder, lightning, storm,
let the next three days be gone.

Northern cloud front, western sun,
while the southerlies have come.

Wind is rising at my back,
Washington Bridge traffic, trucks.

Willing weather: heal me, heel,
or all else miserable.

It has rained four forty days,
left me stewing in my daze.

Mark my word, the water’s line
will keep rising in your mind.

Beer, port, vodka, whiskey, wine,
just ’bout now would be de-vine.

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Alex Cigale’s poems have recently appeared in The Cafe, Colorado, Global City, Green Mountains and North American reviews, Drunken Boat, Hanging Loose, McSweeney’s, and Zoland Poetry. Other work can be found online at The Adirondack Review, Babel Fruit, Big Bridge, The Externalist [PDF], nthposition, The Potomac Journal, Quarter After Eight, The Salt River Review, and Synaesthetic. His translations from the Russian can be found in Crossing Centuries: the New Generation in Russian Poetry and in The Manhattan and St. Ann’s reviews. He was born in Chernovtsy, Ukraine and lives in New York City.