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What the Wind May Do

The wind’s come out to exercise today.
It tests itself: how long can it exhale?
With steady breath it makes the trees obey:
they bend while waiting for the rush to fail.
It tires of that pursuit; the steady pace
becomes a series of percussive bursts.
Though rudely shoved, limbs soon regain the place
that’s theirs when air is evenly dispersed.
All this is but routine, a little game
that breezes play to keep themselves in shape,
so that when Nature knows the time has come
she can unleash a force of such ill fame
that none—branch, tree, or forest—will escape;
nor we, green suburb down to grayest slum.

an earlier version published
in Green Silk Journal, Spring, 2022

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Home Repairs

—allegory prompted by “Vandals Within,” by Anthony
Esolen, The Catholic Thing, February 11, 2025

The situation’s bad, you know.
_It’s time something was done.
Your tools and strength are nearly gone;
Funds for repairs are running low.

If you should fail to seal that leak,
_you know things will get worse.
You search and find an empty purse:
that means waiting at least a week.

A week becomes a month or more.
_Somehow you’ve lost the will
to fix the window or its sill,
though you’ve found means you might explore.

The same for that crack in the wall
_and pests around your place.
Of movement on your part no trace:
inaction holds you in its thrall.

Next, competence abandons you.
_Check angles? Use a square?
Such menial skills are now quite rare,
since culture’s fall you’ve prompted, too.

As rottenness around you grows,
_you think it not so bad:
“I’ve let things go—that’s sorta sad;
still, love of order’s all a pose!”

At last, wreckage is your desire;
_you rampage on and on.
You won’t stop till the house is gone—
each beam, pipe, shingle, strand of wire.

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Julian D. Woodruff writes poetry and short fiction for children and adults. He recently finished 2020-2021, a poetry collection. A selection of his work can be read at Parody Poetry, Lighten Up Online, Carmina Magazine, and Reedsy.

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19 Responses

  1. Roy Eugene Peterson

    “What the Wind May Do” coincides with “Home Repairs” nicely. Recently I found two asphalt shingles in my yard. I hoped they were from a neighbor’s house, since my own inspection of my roof could not discern any missing. I waited a while but then finally called a roofer and he found limited damage to the roof over my garage. I no longer had the skills or desire to fix it, much as you indicated. The wind is sometimes powerful here in West Texas and your description is mindful of its destructive force. There was a time when I fixed everything having learned carpenter skills from my dad. You are so accurate with your excellent thoughts on letting things go.

    Reply
  2. Brian Yapko

    Julian, both of these poems are stunning! “What the Wind May Do” is beautifully crafted and evocatively atmospheric — but what really grabs me is the anthropomorphizing of the Wind — its powers and caprices. Your setting is modern and yet the conceit behind it is so very ancient. You could change a few of the words and this could then be ancient Greece. I love its timelessness.

    “Home Repairs’ is my favorite of the two, however, You say so much in an extended metaphor which works very well as a plaint regarding home improvements but which grows in signficance and stature into a powerful allegory for the rot and entropy that now plagues Western civilization — from within. It’s amazing how easily it all unravels and it’s equally amazing at how easy it is to let it go. One must expend energy to preserve things. Where is that energy now? Your lines “As rottenness around you grows,/_you think it not so bad” really struck me because it’s what I see all around me. People keep letting things go — formality, dignity, discipline, boundaries — the willingness to go to church, to wear clothes that don’t have holes in them, to sweep a sidewalk, to answer a phone call live rather than by text, to walk to the corner rather than drive, to take the trouble to read history, to try to understand… That rottenness is everywhere but starts out so subtly that it’s hard to even notice until the things we value are gone past saving.

    Reply
    • Julian D. Woodruff

      Thanks for your usual thoughtful response, Brian. There is so much to lament in society today. One thing I think about is the energy that must go into the activity of an entity like Antifa, to cite only one example. The energy has always been present, it seems, but 100 to 150 years ago, how much more likely people would have been to channel that energy into some constructive action

      Reply
  3. Julian D. Woodruff

    Thanks for commenting, Roy. In 23 years of home ownership I never did more than bandage style work on my roof, but I know a frugal little retired librarian who at 70 reroofed her house entirely unaided.

    Reply
  4. Paul A. Freeman

    I’ve rarely, if ever, seen personification used as extensively and as well as you’ve used it in ‘What the Wind May Do’, Julian.

    As for ‘Home Repairs, my father was a classic home repairs procrastinator. When I find I can’t get the job done, I cut my losses, hire a pro and take my domestic humiliation in my stride.

    Thanks for the reads.

    Reply
    • Julian D. Woodruff

      Thanks for reading, Paul. I thought personification appropriate: the wind often behaves very unpredictably. Also, personification helps broaden the poem’s focus or applicability, making it suitably paired with “Home Repairs.” Both poems should raise the question, “What are we doing to ourselves?”

      Reply
  5. Susan Jarvis Bryant

    Julian, I am an instant fan of both poems. By the time I got to the closing lines of “Home Repairs” (clever title) – I had the lyrics of “The Eve of Destruction” swirling around my head. For me, both poems sing of destruction, the first at Mother Nature’s hand, the second at man’s.

    “What the Wind May Do” is my favorite. I am a huge fan of the sonnet form, and this one is beautifully and smoothly wrought. I love that “series of percussive bursts” (a mellifluous treat) and how the wind grows progressively menacing the more exercise it indulges in – “All this is but routine, a little game / that breezes play to keep themselves in shape” is a great image. The powerful, hurricane-sized jolt of the apocalyptic closing couplet makes me feel my mortality and lets me know that I’ll never be in control here on God’s green earth. Having the regular threat of hurricanes hanging over my head, and having gone through Hurricane Harvey, this poem is really dear to my heart – it’s a poem I will be returning to. You personify wind with poetic aplomb. Julian, thank you!

    Reply
    • Julian D. Woodruff

      Thank you, Susan. I knew “Wind” would speak to you. I’ve experienced nothing so devastating as Harvey, but still have vivid memories of the parade of cleanup vehicles from as far away as Massachusetts in the wake of the destruction from the wind storm that hit Rochester in 2016, and of being blown over on the deck of the ferry from Port Angeles to Vancouver Island in 1957. And I think of the famous wreckage of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge, the subject of a study by a team of engineers that included my grandfather. In upstate NY I saw plenty of abandoned old barns that I imagined being subjected to strong winds (poem “The Barn,” posted on the Aphelion Webzine).

      Reply
  6. Margaret Coats

    Thanks, Julian, for your allegory and for citing the Anthony Esolen article on which it’s based. In both, the ultimate desire for, or celebration of, destruction at first seems a shock, insufficiently motivated by the observed decline in activity and competence. Wouldn’t a person simply collapse and acquiesce in the rot? But when I go back and look more carefully, both you and Esolen reveal loss of will at the beginning of the process. You start with images of disheartened disrepair, and at line 10 reveal the loss of will is already in the past. That’s the fundamental problem, not nearly as clear to the persona as external difficulties he’d like to face if he could.

    The result is really self-directed anger destroying one’s own property, and laying the blame anywhere but on the self. That’s what we see in formerly civilized society and in many individuals who self-righteously take part in de-civilization.

    Your allegory is a splendid one, in part because it works on the social and individual levels. A house is a psychological symbol for the self, as you probably know. Yet it is also a place where the individual lives in common with (or as a neighbor to) others. The one thing that seems slightly off for the allegory genre is the mention of “culture.” What is being allegorized doesn’t appear by name in the allegorical picture. But here I think you need to blame the persona (who will not blame himself) for something beyond personal and domestic disaster. Otherwise this poem could be read as a simple satire on lazy delays by irresponsible homeowners. Bringing “culture” into it, where you do, prepares for the active ending shock that echoes broadly beyond the individual.

    “What the Wind May Do” also features an unexpected and significant word, namely, the “ill fame” cited as something the wind may acquire. Sure, windstorms can earn a bad name, but it’s also commonplace to say that “ill fame” is easily spread by the slightest breeze–and reputations destroyed can never be fully repaired. This moral touch reinforces your point about random severity of the wind itself, and the other point about defenseless humanity being subject to it.

    Reply
    • Julian D. Woodruff

      Thank you for such an appreciative and challenging response, Margaret.
      If I get your comment on “Repairs,” I was trying to convey the thought that through indolence individuals are responsible for the collapse of a culture. I don’t exempt myself from this charge; still, as a public school teacher, I was often stunned by the absence of effort and care on the part of students (gen x-ers who are now the main agents of society). I often told them that a student I’d encountered, with a measured IQ of 80, had turned out a better paragraph of English prose than they were willing to (or, in some cases, I’m afraid unable to). Please let me know if I have missed your point.
      On “Wind,” you’re right about ill fame: 2-3 years ago I felt positively robbed by the wind. I had taken a prized lamp out to a hardware store for minor repair, & when I went to pick it up (needing no repair after all), I set it down while I unlocked my car. That was enough time for a gust of wind (on an only mildly windy day) to knock it over (despite its heavy base) and smash a decorative glass pear-shaped feature on its stem. Still, that was an instance of very bad timing more than of “ill-famed” wind, I would say. The winds that spread the recent fires in southern California, which moved you to verse recently, are more like it.

      Reply
    • Margaret Coats

      Yes, Julian, I agree with you that individuals become responsible for the collapse of culture and civilization. You call their problem “indolence” while I refer back to “loss of will.” These things are related, and it’s not easy to say which comes first. If I may bring in the Latin root verb “doleo,” its meaning is to grieve, be sorrowful, or suffer pain. The little bit of trouble it takes to do minor repairs may be painful, but we would not call it “grievous.” An act of will can overcome it. Everyone has some sins of omission, as you admit (again, I agree), but at some point hard to define, the individual begins to excuse himself, take pleasure in the pain rather than in the work, and use the minor pain to justify indolence rather than effort. Brian Yapko above mentions going to church as one thing that requires willingness. Anthony Esolen comes to the point where, in his effort of will, he refuses to ask for help from the Church. The Church should be a bastion of civilization and culture, and it is painful to discover otherwise when one makes the effort to attend. It is a MUCH larger question as to what the individual Christian can do to effect restoration when he makes little or no effort in his own home. And it is very easy to come up with an Antifa type plan to abandon Church culture and go on to wreck it. History demonstrates. I hope this application of your poetic logic makes sense. Those little pains are calls to work somewhere, and your idea, I take it, is for the individual to at least understand personal responsibility and make an act of will that may lead to better things.

      Reply
  7. Joseph S. Salemi

    That Esolen article has a brilliant line:

    “I ask for no help from the Church, and I expect none.”

    Reply
    • Julian D. Woodruff

      It’s the Church that needs help, I think we agree, Joseph. Just not from the government.

      Reply
  8. Shamik Banerjee

    Breathtaking imagery in What the Wind May Do: the branches regaining their places when the wind moderates its speed is commendable, and so is the message. Home Repairs is a classic example of the impact a piece with extended metaphor has. Thanks for sharing these, Julian.

    Reply
    • Julian D. Woodruff

      Thank you for reading, Shamik. I’m glad you liked this pair. To me, the wind is so variable an unpredictable that it often really does imitate personal behavior–especially that of someone by whom you might be taken aback now & then.
      On metaphor: I hope you looked at Margaret’s response. She is usually a much closer reader than I am.

      Reply
  9. C.B. Anderson

    Each of these poems put me in mind of an old saw or two, of which the poems seemed like elegant expansions. Respectively:

    It’s an ill wind that blows no good.

    and

    A stitch in time saves nine.

    Reply
    • Julian D. Woodruff

      I’m rarely as succinct as these chestnuts, CB–as you well know. Which may explain my attraction to the wind as a subject.

      Reply
  10. Adam Sedia

    Both poems present thoughtful allegories. I really enjoyed “Home Repair.” Not only do you capture the frustrations of a homeowner (at least one who cares — or cares at first), but you take a dark turn that sadly shows where our society has headed. (Anthony Esolen is one of my favorite polemicists, by the way.)

    “What the Wind May Do” is, I think, even more subtle in its allegory, requiring a careful reading to grasp your argument. It is the perfect accompaniment to “Home Repairs.” May I suggest a third poem about a wind that destroys the house in disrepair?

    Reply
    • Julian D. Woodruff

      Thank you for your kind comments, Adam. Indeed, Esolen’s piece, aside from prompting my “Repairs” poem, put me in mind of the previously-published “Wind,” which I thought needed the small adjustment I gave it here.
      There is a third poem already (kinda): see my response to Susan Jarvis Bryant, above.

      Reply

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