An Extract from This Month's Release: Knowing When to Run (Another 365 Days of Poetry)

To celebrate this month's release of Another 365 Days of Poetry which released on the 4th. Links to the collection can be found at: https://books2read.com/u/bo2Y0a.

 

Knowing When to Run

 

Written on June 14, 2017, for the May 14 entry of Another 365 Days of Poetry, this piece came out of nowhere, but is very Seuss-like in its rhythm and near nonsensicality.

 

Held to a branch,

hoping not to die,

the soldier watched the beasts pass by.

The soldier watched the beasts pass by,

holding to his branch and hoping not to die.

 

Thunder-footed,

passing below,

not one beast looked aloft,

but their steps made the trees shake and bow,

and the soldier’s grip he lost.

 

He lost his grip, and down he fell,

grabbing at each branch that passed,

and though he’d let go, his luck it held,

and the lowest branch he caught fast.

 

The beasts they passed,

his grip it held,

and now he had a tale to tell,

a tale to tell to all who’d hear

of the beasts that he had come to fear.

 

And of those beasts

who’d passed him by

not a single one remained,

and the townsfolk, when they learned of them,

learned to fear again.

 

For the great beasts run, when danger comes,

and man should do the same.

 

Cover art is by Jake at JCaleb Design, and links to 366 Days of Poetry can be found on Books2Read at: https://books2read.com/u/bo2Y0a.