Storming in, a dark presence
overshadows the valley.
Denizens look up and flee in terror,
into their shelters in the ground.
Everyone scurries to haul away their scraps,
most more than they can handle.
The thunder of my big leather boot and giant’s voice
threatens to blot out the sun and squish
the sandbox ant colony.
A frenzy of black bodies
with no visible pattern or plan,
makes me laugh. I am the ruler high and mighty
upon my mountaintop seat
at the edge of the sandbox,
and I revel in my power.
All that work for these desert pioneers
struggling to erect their homestead
at this desolate outpost,
only to expand to outposts more and more remote:
the sidewalk, the driveway, the neighbor’s front stoop.
They would civilize and conquer--
but not so easily with my kingly interference.
Suddenly, a rumble above me
from quickly darkening clouds
roiling in the wind-whipped sky above.
I grumble in defeat,
humbled as I desert my throne
to seek shelter from the rain.
--Ellen H.
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