Old Man And The Pothole Poem by Kewayne Wadley

Then There, out of nowhere it appeared,
For those who came across it, it was unavoidable,
An Unwelcomed guest in something otherwise so perfect,
There, it sunk,
Leaving its print, As if laughing,
Unknowingly to it's victims,
There across the street he sat,
On the porch with his wooden stool, back against the bland plywood,
Arms folded, with a crumbled carton of Virgina Slims,
Watching the cars zoom by,
Unknowingly Caught off guard by the pothole's presence,
A loud thud would echo,
Sometimes sparks,
As tires immediately went flat after their brief meeting, if not worse, a tire rod perhaps,
Son of a bitch, Damn it, a dastardly deed indeed, If hit hard enough,
For those who had it, that little orange light would come on,
Just as automatic as it was placed, follow by a loud ding of the sensor,
You could hear the plastic tearing. From where the tire jumped too hard underneath the car,
For those unfortuate enough,
The worst of enemies, the cars whom passed and couldn't swerve in time and this odd sized pothole,
Across the street,
The old man could identify with the abnormal sinkhole,
Next to his crumbled pack of Virgina Slims, where he'd sit for hours, back against the wooden house,
He'd reach for that red three dollar lighter with some imprinted image on it,
Torn, faded, from the constant handling of it,
placing it in and out of his pocket,
Hitting against keys, pocket change, whatever else he'd keep in there,
He'd pull one cigarette out of that ol' paper package discarding it for a moment then placing the cigarette between his lips,
Rolling that strike that ignited his lighter,
That cherry burned bright orange as he inhaled, watching the pothole,
We have much in common,
He thought, as he looked on at that ol' pothole,
Those in-escapable thoughts as he continued to look on,
Not wanted,
Face down in our luck,
Quickly avoided, saught as an hinderence for those we really don't mean to cause problems for,
His soft dull gray hair blew in the wind,
He flicked his ashes against the grain of the wind,
Sympathizing with the sinkhole,
As his kids hardly came to visit him anymore, now grown, gone about their lives,
The pothole faced his house across the street,
Impatient,
Irritating the driver's in their freshly brought cars,
Driven over, soon to be forgotten,
With it's deep wrinkles that reflected that of the crow's feet around the old man's eyes,
Left alone, forlorn to the incest of obsenities shouted,
Soon to be forgotten later,
The pothole began to speak,
Not known company in quite some time,
Always disguarded,
The old man was soon reminded of his pet rock that he use to keep when he was younger,
As he found himself filling the void left in both their lives