Hailey Leithauser

How to Volcano

The heat’s the least
of it, or if not
the least, the lesser
disorder than the fun
of the shock, the blowing
off of the top, and
the vent and the rain
astonishingly
unexplained,
made all the more
historic
and spectacular
by the peaceably
friable sleep of the
off-guard
individuals,
those pacifists and
rationalists,
unforeseeing its
release.

Quartets

A heartthrob offers up a nuzzling
while graveyards are a place for pitying,
and snowstorms bring a kind of dizzying
as rainfall makes a muted muzzling.

A rainstorm craves a place for whispering
and heartaches burn into a blistering, .
while snowballs are a cause for hollering,
and graveness signals something hallowing.

A gravecloth takes a time of measuring,
while rainbows name a place of treasuring,
and heartlands are a place for brothering.
where snowbanks have a need for shoveling.

A snowflakes finds a time for singling,
and gravestones have a need of mattering,
and heartbeats make a case for marrying
(though raindays can be cause for tarrying).

One raindrop pleads a need for batttening
as snowfall makes the case for fattening,
and faint hearts mutter of their martyring,
as dug graves mark a final bartering.