Mountain Storm

Cumulonimbus lurking peering over white-topped peaks like childhood's hunchbacked monsters waiting there to pounce Shadows lick the creviced slopes as white and green become gray lights flash behind the drawn shades of ominous clouds Darkness pours into valleys where rows of birches waver as if nervously laughing on the river shore Relentlessly advancing the storm growls and cracks and snaps and the landscape disappears behind wind and rain God's angry swords slash the dark each plunge deep with loud report and all bow at its advance some shatter and fall Gone now like it never came still grumbling as it departs to disturb more peaceful scenes beyond the valley Halfway up the mountainside the sun plays at the tree line below a more peaceful gray ushers in the night March 31, 2019 / 2019 Poetry Marathon Final / Sponsor: Mark Toney Published in a seasonal anthology Kind of a Hurricane Press