While vacationing in Florida recently, on the Gulf coast, I experienced some¬ 
thing very similar which reminded me of the Constance Bay episode. A squall 
line of thundercells moved inland and the air pressure dropped underneath 
them. A high pressure air mass moving behind the squalls pressed down on the 
Gulf waters forcing them high up the beach and across the boulevard. Auto 
drivers suddenly found themselves driving in a meter of foaming salt water. 
One unusual effect of this storm was that the heated swimming pools of hotels 
and apartments all along the coast were filled with salt water. The high winds 
(60 + mph) blew all day and added up to 30 centimeters of wind-blown sand 
to the bottom of the pools. 
The storm was frightening, but interesting; I wouldn’t have missed it. 
The Chase 
With true hunter’s grace 
a shrike atop a roadside willow 
leaves with a flourish, darts 
away along the snow-filled ditch 
hovers over a weedy patch 
then sails back to the same perch. 
Seconds later a small dark object 
comes out from the weeds 
skitters across the fresh snow 
a frightened mouse, I think 
but no, some unknown thing 
like a curled-up caterpillar 
upright, blown by the wind 
aerodynamically stable, rolling 
down the road past the shrike- 
will it strike, we wonder 
but it simply watches silently 
its eye more discerning than ours. 
Curious by now, I jump out 
to retrieve it, run down the 
slippery road trying to block it 
with one foot without stepping on it... 
a strange chase - finally catch up 
with it and pounce, then laugh 
holding this tuft of brown fur 
still attached to thin skin 
a bit of meadow mouse still 
running with the wind 
remnant of shrike’s bounty... 
of such fine parts am I now 
enriching my life. 
Robert Nero 
15 
