Hurricanes

They are destruction.  They are warfare and fear and danger all at once.

We are destruction.  We are warfare and fear and danger and terror and love and hate, refusal and wanting all at the same time.

They remind you what is important.
I forget every reason why I hate you every time there is a chance you won't come back to me
I hate instead the chance that you won't return.

Hurricanes bring you back to me.
Spinning, drowning, falling, flailing, back to me,
And every stupid reason that you left disappears, hurricanes bring us back together

I don't have time to be angry with you
Because time is limited
You don't have the time to try to leave me
Because hurricanes may tear us apart
I told you, you know I told you so, we always find each other eventually.

There are a million things to worry about in a storm.
We worry about your car
And our friends
And our families
And our town
And whether we're going to see each other again
And I selfishly worry about you.
I want to tell you more than anything that I love you
That I'm not only going to be your best friend, but your sisters' too
That my brother is going to love you only slightly less than I do
That my mother is going to smile when she sees you every Christmas
That my father will pretend that he hates you but you will win him over in a matter of minutes, just like you did me.

But you put yourself in danger
You throw yourself into the center of the storm like you should throw yourself into me
Because the hurricane doesn't know that your laugh is contagious.
The hurricane doesn't know that your smile makes me forget what I'm doing.
The hurricane doesn't realize that you're a hero but I do.  I already do.

And when the death toll comes in its not going to matter whether they count you as a hero or a victim because I'm not going to care
To me you are more than a number
To me you will always be the boy from the party
The boy with the jokes and the politics and the understanding
Because you were my hero before the hurricane

The hurricane that brings us together wanting wishing laughing desperate
The hurricane that tears us apart
grasping, clutching, holding onto empty air, shouting I love you's to a boy that has always listened but never heard me.

So when the hurricane passes,
Leaving destruction much more serious than damage we inflict upon each other’s hearts
We'll find your car
And our friends
And our families
And build our town back up again
But in the first moments of the aftermath
In the first second of quiet,
And there is nothing left but you and me
Hold me close.

Because hurricanes bring us together
But they don't always have to tear us apart.