Katrina's Outrage - Kimberly Satterfield

1.

Katrina wrestled the with the wind,

her boy child,

wild from the unbearable heat

burning the heavens.



He escaped from her grasp,

crashing

like a slap across the city of New Orleans .



2.



After Katrina tamed her boy

her eyes screamed.

She wailed the sea from her mouth

when she saw that her girl child,

the earth was dying,



New Orleans drowned in the storm of her tears.



3.



For greed and foolishness

the pale men stood silent,

hung their fear like a noose



around the necks

of the not-yet-dead,

deaf to the hundreds -

the thousands of voices

crying out in the night for help.



4.

The elders,

the mothers with babies waited for the boats

as the water rose from their ankles to their necks -



-the boats never came.



5.



After Katrina,

surprised a nation that has lost its breath

she plunged her raw, uncompromising power

into the hearts of the women while they wept

into to the breasts of men who understood



that they must offer as oblations to the sacrifice;

the hundreds and thousands of bodies

that cover the floor of New Orleans with bony blankets



and to the survivors

waiting for Katrina to come again

with a different name

to avenge them.