storm memories

two summers ago aaron and i went to the ross and saw paranoid park.
we left the isolation of the theater to the eerie silence of a tornado map.
what's a tornado map? when the sky looks blue, green, orange, yellow like a map.
because of a tornado.
we got a little panicked because the sky was black and green
and whipping branches and leaves like confetti or flour beaten in a bowl.
he lived in a dim dark dirty basement,
better a basement than my second-story,
in a tornado.
so we went to the dim dark dirty basement and sat and watched as thunder and lightning
snapped trees
lines
lights
crashed the earth in booms that made me thankful
i was in the dim dark basement
listening to the radio
holding hands
under a warm blanket
safe.