Poem sunday

Storm Coming

I heard something like
A stray dog's low growl

And went outside to check.

There she was---8 feet up---- in a wretched tree

Wedged between a cachectic trunk 

And a crooked scurvied limb.

Hey what’s with that look on your face?

I’ve seen that look before:

The bills are late.

Dad didn’t hear a word you said.

The lovely girl across the bar

Chatting up another guy.

Passed over at work,

Picked last, too short,

Passing another whole day unseen,

Passing the next unable to hide 

The things you want to keep inside.

The feeling the world won’t simply unfurl

Anymore from within but simply hurtles

Forward,clacking and whistling, runaway train

From somewhere around the bend.

But the tracks seem overgrown with weeds--

How can this be? as the whistles scream

And the lights bear down;

You’re frozen in time and place,

A deer spooked halfway across the interstate.

Hey little girl, don't scowl like that.

Hey now, sweet girl, you're still only ten….

She says the boy she likes

Has a crush on her own best friend

And there’s that low rumble again,

Of a train somewhere around the bend.

Or maybe it's a far away thunder.

Those clouds are clumping up gray.

You'd best come down from the fray;

Trees are a bad place to get caught

When the lightning decides to strike.

8/30/19