Huff and Puff
Aileen Lu | Art by Grace Chu
From the dust upon the ground
you read of walls that rose up,
built of nature’s bones to surround
our fragile weary ones and cup
lives within, protecting us from
the eternal and infamous hound.
Always in every single kingdom
we were stone-laden, bound
safely inside as one little pig,
wishing to never be found.
Beyond, the light glows bright
and warms our earthy shelter,
but above safety from howling plight
we yearn for a lofty throne, higher
than this shield that smothers sight
of the cunning, shifting hound that lurks
not simply outside but with our fright
within our minds; may it never smirk
again with howling winds as it bites,
we shall live without wolves within us.
Rising now you look around
and see not a single twig,
fear not for there is no sound,
no noise but that which we make,
and a howl cut short from the light,
trapped within the walls of the pound.
There is no more left for us to take
and we lie in wait, heavy and round.
Never such a whimsical sight,
human hounds that only wound.