Relentless across the coastal scrub
it hammers hills into dust, probing
with icy hands the moonlit night,
the cruel northern wind is a Cannonball.

A lamp once golden in the dawn of youth
has now failed so often of late,
tonight resurrected in Phoenician splendor
to run ahead of the gusting breath.

Sweeping across thin strips of tacky earth,
muddy pools scattered and challenging
around which eddies
its powerful force.

Darkness complete and bright
hides more than small depressions,
absent were the beasts and birds
who care not for such obsession.

Spinning and roiling around and around
chain links running silently over jagged teeth,
stress so incessant that even the wind itself
howls in contented suffering.

Across the fields and along the ridgeline
coming around to face the leeward southern vistas,
speed dissolves stress and worry, for
the cruel northern wind is a Cannonball.