tornado

i wrote this by candle light covered in cow shit (me, not the candle light) the night of the tornado...

the sun was out, but it was raining. big, cold, alligator tear drop rain. the kind of rain that is usually accompanied by hail. to the east, dark clouds brood, highlighted by the arc of a rainbow so perfect that i'm sure you could've slid down it into another land made of candy tended by unicorns if only you could reach it. the scene would've made for a good picture puzzle if it weren't for the earily broken trees, flattened corn fields, collapsed barns, roofs completely torn off homes; the road side strewn with broken glass, twisted bits of metal siding, spintered wood and all kinds of unidentifiable rubble.

from a hill on the farm we watched the massive twister touch down, spewing debris every which way. the air was being sucked into the storm, the clouds above gathering and spiraling in an angry dance miles in diameter that made me breathe heavily with fear and awe. the tornado itself was 3 or 4 miles away, over the next hill to the northwest. it moved east, close enough to raise my pulse a bit, but far enough away to walk to the road for a better view. it was hard to distinguish the actual funnel cloud within the whirling dirt and bits of trees and broken pieces of people's lives.

it pulled up. i exhaled. hovering a hundred metres or so above the ground it blew swiftly east. then, churning and raging, it touched down again. now across from the farm and moving south, directly towards us.

we ran. rob grabbed daisy and i knuckles and we met in the basement. rob grabbed the camera and headed back up, shouting at me to keep the animals calm. i sat in the dark listening hard for any disturbances. i could hear nothing so i crept back up and cautiously stuck my head out of the back door. i could see the tornado heading east again. we were out of danger. the storm had decided to follow the road that runs parallel to ours, a mile away.

shakey with adrenalin we set off to survey the damage. a friend of rob's, an organic beef farmer named troutman, has a barn down. a few calves are trapped. troutman is stunned, but calm. i notice this attitude from everyone we meet who was hit by this spiral of wind. a couple of other neighbors show up and we set to work uncovering the young cows. they have names like goofy and supercow. they are spooked but otherwise unharmed. they blink at us with their huge eyes.

cows are much more stubborn and skittish than vegetables. it is obvious that rob and i do not have much experience with animals, but we do what we can and with the help of a chainsaw, a jack, muscle and patience, the calves are freed.

now that they are in the open, we must corral them again. this proves much more challenging and comical, but eventually we coax and/or shove the calves into an unharmed barn.

it is dark now and we are covered in cow shit. the full moon has risen, heavy over the horizon. it glows so bright i have to squint to look at it.