In their impatience,
In their petulance,
And with eider elbows flashing fit to fly,
They jostled and jousted
For position ‘A’ precedence
Hard on the heels of mother in her web-foot wake,
Squabbling and babbling their battle around the lake shoreline,
Whilst, some hundred or so metres beyond,
The same scene was being played out -
The mother of all petrol tankers
Steaming steadily up the forest road to Feldberg,
Followed, line astern, by her brood:
A restless road-full of four-wheeled frenzy
All overanxious to overtake:
Accelerating,
Risk-taking
Then frantically braking
Their race up the ranks,
Throwing all caution to the little wind there was
As if they were one-down and last-ditch-effort desperate
In the final few cup-final seconds.
That would be me in the morning,
But today it was ‘for the birds’.
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Upon watching this play out on and beside Lake Titisee and thinking that I was glad I still had a few hours away from the 'rat race'.
Tony Jolley
http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/for-the-birds-4/