PAD Day 28: Storm Clouds

Today's prompts from Poetic Asides and NaPoWriMo: (1) Write a "looking back" and/or "looking forward" poem, and (2) inspired by a brief reminiscence by Emily Dickinson's niece of visiting her aunt's bedroom: describe a bedroom from your past. These two prompts mesh almost perfectly, and though I've written about my favorite childhood bedroom in the past, I thought I'd visit it again with a new poem:

Weatherman

I'm sitting in my bedroom at twelve.

My parents have just redecorated the room

for my birthday, a more mature look.

White painted furniture includes a new desk;

nautical flags and sailing ships grace the wallpaper.

But my pride and joy is the other birthday present -

a junior weather station just outside my window.

I've always loved science, and think of myself

as a budding meteorologist. The anemometer spins,

catching the wind in its pinwheel  cups.

The hygrometer tells me the humidity in the air

with a simple calculation. The max-min thermometer 

registers highs and lows, and the barometer

is the oracle, predicting incoming weather

with the augury of air pressure - a downward tick

in the needle today means rain is on the way.

I document everything in a red notebook

on my bright white desk, but soon something else

will take over these pages - random musings

and thoughts set to poetry, as I begin

to chart the storms of adolescence.