Corey Mesler

 COREY MESLER is the owner of Burke’s Book Store, in Memphis, Tennessee, one of the country’s oldest (1875) and best independent bookstores. He has published poetry and fiction in numerous journals including Pindeldyboz, Orchid, Thema, Mars Hill Review, Poet Lore and others. He has also been a book reviewer for The Memphis Commercial Appeal and The Memphis Flyer. A short story of his was chosen for the 2002 edition of New Stories from the South: The Year’s Best, published by Algonquin Books. His first novel, Talk: A Novel in Dialog.

 

More about the Storm

 

  “Terrifying as the monologue of a storm.”

  Victor Hugo

 

 

Winds as straight as a lance

tore through my

neighborhood like a vivisection,

and left me powerless,

sitting on my porch

in the heat, watching the

men in hats wander around, for

all the world like afreets,

mystery guests on a damaged Earth.

 

At 3

 

At 3 am

I am dying.

By five

I have to stand

if I can.

Six finds me

sipping

coffee in a

cold den.

The day wrinkles

around me

like too

much skin.

The TV

whispers its

message:

this time

you

were not dying.