The Pigs and the Pine Tree
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Those pigs were big black razor backs and it was either climb the tree or run. Pine trees don't have limbs so it wasn't easy but if I hadn't been able to go up that tree I was pig food. I was quite young and strong and very nimble and it was a do or die situation.
Once upon a time so very long ago,
I took my dogs out for a run not far from home and so,
I thought we would all be fine beneath the cooling shadows,
Of the trees and bushes as we ran past fields and fallow.
The forest was the place for us where we might see a deer,
And mayhap chase some rabbits and splash through streams so clear.
We loved the forest and the fields, loved resting in the shade,
Of the Pine grove way out back where squirrels and wild things played.
One day while we hunted there to see what we might find,
We happened on a bunch of pigs, not tame, the wild kind.
Big black tuskers that they were with humps and sloping heads.
You can't chase them, they won't run, they'll chase you instead.
Immediately the dogs gave chase and just as quickly scattered.
I went straight up the nearest tree, escape was all that mattered.
The dogs went home and gathered 'round the porch and Mama knew,
Something was wrong and called the boys and they were worried too.
The dogs went home without me, a sign something was up.
They told them "Go find Judy!", the trail was soon picked up.
The pigs had gathered 'round the tree where I hung and cried.
I could hear Mom calling me, worried what betide,
Her wandering girl out in those woods, she sent the boys to find me.
Meanwhile the pigs got tired and left so I came down the Pine tree.
My uncles laughed and laughed at me as they told the story,
Of how they found me in the woods climbing down a Pine tree.
Copyright © Judy Ball | Year Posted 2022
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