As months go by and seasons change
We watch the outside rearrange
Nature knows a change is due,
And it’s not hard to see a clue
Like puppies frozen to a tree
While going out to take a pee;
Digging mammals, shivering bucks,
Will all soon know that winter sucks.
At first we think it’s not too bad.
We’ll tell ourselves we won’t be sad,
As plant life dies and smart birds flee
And utilities charge a higher fee.
So-called dumb beasts burrow down
To spent all winter in the ground
And never see the frigid season –
Who would want to? There’s no reason.
The deer that ran all summer, free
Look to the future, and when they see
The coming winter, run their hide
In front of cars: deer suicide.
 |
| "You just wait 'til November." |
The people who have earned their pensions
Have long made known their full intentions
To head down south, and send postcards
From
They’re wearing sandals with white socks
Or maybe out-there Birkenstocks
While pink flamingos’ flag their grass
They tell the winter, “Kiss my butt!”
But we the workers must stay there
Where all is froze, from toes to hair
With no more comfort than to say
At least we’re not Canuks today.
Because it’s true, or so we hear
Our weather’s not the worst to bear:
The Weather Channel made some calls
And featured International Falls.
 |
| Just finish covering me with snow and leave me until spring. |
Not one bit better do we feel
As we suffer through this bitter pill.
It’s bad enough to feel this pain,
To make it worse, we can’t complain!
And so we skate across the lots
While searching for our parking slots
More fender benders as we slide
From one curb to the other side.
We get the after-crash advice
To let it go, or else the price
Of our insurance hits the roof,
Or just gets canceled, and goes poof.
On that we have to take a pass –
We need our cash to pay the gas.
The meter spins at higher speeds
To meet the frozen public’s needs
For someplace warm to thaw our toes
And that’s not outside, Heaven knows.
Nor can our car’s heat melt the ice --
The price of fuel has risen twice
Just since we got home from our work,
Which took an hour, ‘cause some jerk
In an SUV, (thought he could do his thing)
Crashed in a ditch and caused a scene.
It may be true four wheel drive’s nice,
But doesn’t do a thing on ice
Especially when the guy inside
Has little brains, but lots of pride
And somehow thinks that he’s immune
To weather you don’t see in June.
And driving like a maniac,
He puts his truck up on its back.
Which leads the rest of us, quite snidely
To laugh at his misfortune widely.
Despite the danger that, down the road
It might be us who ends up snowed.
Once Christmas goes, there’s nothing new
For we poor Hoosiers to look forward to
Just slushy ground and blackened trees
And snow that comes up to our knees,
Ah, but then March arrives.
The end’s in sight, so we surmise.
We start to feel, and with good reason,
That we survived another season.
It’s true, the roads are covered now
With melted ice that no snow plow
Can get removed, but it’s just brief.
Besides, the thawing brings relief
From frostbit skin and higher bills,
And moods so dark that only pills
Could bring us through more rounds of snows
Without our family coming to blows.
 |
| Sometimes it doesn't pay to get off the porch. |
But wait! Just as we regain our reason
Comes basketball playoff season.
The high school teams roam far and wide
And bring back temps that rip our hides.
How is it that the final games
Can bring us so much weather pain?
With snow and sleet and wind and ice,
And other crap that’s just not nice.
The groundhog may have said we’d get
An early end to this, and yet
As long as we have basketball
There’ll be an ice storm ‘fore the fall.
Spring is never early, though.
It will arrive and then we’ll know
We have some time to smile and thaw
Until the heat waves bakes us raw.
So it goes in the Hoosier state:
There’s always something new to hate.
You can get books delivered, so
check us out here:
· Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/-/e/B0058CL6OO
· Barnes & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/s/"Mark R Hunter"
· Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/4898846.Mark_R_Hunter
· Blog: https://markrhunter.blogspot.com/
· Website: http://www.markrhunter.com/
· Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ozma914/
· Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MarkRHunter914
· Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/markrhunter/
· Twitter: https://twitter.com/MarkRHunter
· Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@MarkRHunter
· Substack: https://substack.com/@markrhunter
· Tumblr: https://www.tumblr.com/ozma914
· Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/ozma914
· Audible: https://www.audible.com/search?searchAuthor=Mark+R.+Hunter&ref_pageloadid=4C1TS2KZGoOjloaJ&pf
Remember: Nobody ever crashed into a ditch while reading a book at home.
