VISITING HOUR Poem by Helena Sinervo

Leave the door open, be so kind.
Nothing compares to the wind.
As it blows through the building from the back yard,
the curtains get big bellies, the blinds clank,
the flagpole rope flaps
across the strait, under the bridge, through town
nothing compares.
So, in the springtime, I dream of an autumn storm,
how it knocks down trees and scaffolds,
tears off roofs, nothing compares.
Did you read about the woman who walked her dog on a bridge?
It swooped her into the river, she drowned, I would have liked
to see that, nothing compares.
I've been wondering why
you come here, with your child,
your mother disappeared a long time ago, now she floats
on a calm sea, calm the whites of her eyes.