You’re a lightning bolt, a piercing passageway of violence leading to us, the hair standing on the back of our neck now at attention

You’re a zipper, opening up with raw force and dissonant sound to reveal what’s underneath, the underbelly of the world

You’re a rupture, splitting us into two, then four then dozens upon dozens to millions

You’re a concussion, leaving fog and blurred vision

You’re a silencer, filling lungs, stealing breaths, debilitating voice

You’re a wave, with each realization rolling over us, pushing us deeper underwater, into the dark unknown

You’re dusk, neither darkness nor daylight, eye straining to see, blurred shadows lurking at the edge of the forest

You’re a tornado, leveling this house and its scattered about baby dolls and q-tips and wedding pictures and the detritus of lives well lived, well-loved, and skipping over another house, nary a shingle out of place

You’re a before and you’re an after.