Hurricanes

I searched "hurricane" on my blog, and found that I've written here over the years about Irene, Hanna, Tomas, Sandy, Isaac - and lots more that I just called "the hurricane," since at the time it was obvious which one I meant.  Today we are having a day off school, waiting for Matthew.  Some things never change; tropical life means tropical storms.  But Matthew, reportedly, is going to be different.  They say the only storm in recorded history that resembled it was Flora, in 1963, in which an estimated five thousand Haitians died.  Text messages tell us to stock up on food and water and keep our cellphones charged so we can get news of our loved ones.  We're expecting 15-40 inches of rain, winds of 150 miles per hour (with gusts of 185), flooding, mudslides.  And as Victor Hernandez Cruz, of Puerto Rico, reminds us, in his poem "Problems with Hurricanes," everything can become a projectile in such conditions:  "If you are going out / beware of mangoes / And all such beautiful / sweet things."  (Here's the rest of that poem.)  I'm not going out, but staying home and praying for our dear little Haiti.