Great Gusts: Winds of the World and the Science Behind Them

From Antarctica’s biting katabatic gusts to Hawai‘i’s sweet-smelling moani, discover fourteen winds of the world through poetry and scientific facts.

Lift your face to the breeze—

let it bathe your cheeks

sift through your hair

tease your fingertips.

In a dynamic collection of poems, Melanie Crowder and Megan Benedict explore the world’s winds, from Italy’s swaggering maestro to Libya’s fierce ghibli to Canada’s howling squamish. The poetic styles used reflect the characteristics and sometimes the location of each wind: Japan’s blustery oroshi is celebrated in haiku, for example, while the poem about Britain’s helm uses iambs in a nod toward the iambic pentameter of English sonnets. Sidebars relay the science behind how each wind forms, where it blows, and the weather systems it heralds. More meteorological details can be found in the back matter, which includes explorations of the origin of wind and how winds are named and a glossary.