Legs like barnacles 
swing wide over the heady stone wall 
to await the coming storm —

such joy in a white stucco world
of butterflies and garden gnomes
and fistfuls of choices for breakfast! 

Trees like these ones can sing 
and they line the pavement, burying roots 
and wooden tissues deep under the granite. 

The frogs, of course, know
the fate of the earth. With windy croaks
they claw out tunnels and energy, windswept
to sit along the stone wall and await the storm. 

Glass-textured shivers fall 
upon the clay tiling and 
dirtily drain the dust from the swept hillsides. 

Oh, my dearest Children, 
the threshold of the storm 
has slid beneath your muddy soles!