Anxious Poets Society
Spare Me Summer
This green leaf is a seasonal disappointment,
an unlit sparkler in the hands of this petulant child,
a cruel test of patience with no clear deadline.
So much potential, so much joy, so much beauty,
locked away from the world
inside this grotesque, veiny prison.
Callous green abomination.
Majestic hostage taker.
Most unsightly.
Perhaps this unwelcome green guest will combust,
and die slowly before us.
Let it burst into flame and detonate in my hand;
An autumn grenade of brilliant yellows and ambers, oranges and reds,
before being hurled to the ground to curl and brown.
Mocking the forgotten greens
relegated to the trees
as it crunches under the feet
of laughing children and happy families,
or body surfs into a storm drain,
or becomes mush in wet pavement.
But until this magnificent day of autumn’s parole,
I must suffer the summer,
and the torments of the living.
Until then, all around me is envy, with green.
Until then, this monochrome misery.
Until then, nothing green will do.
RJ Flannigan is an East Coast transplant now writing out of Seattle, WA. His literary style combines the aggression and edge of a Northeast upbringing with the natural beauty of his West Coast surroundings.