Waiting for the Deluge

 



 

 

 



Thumbing through old

Worn at the edge
Paper bag brown folders of records
Typed up or written down
On papers now soft as cloth
Between the fingertips
Looking for transactions and goings on
Of past happenings in the water business

These much too dry years
With not enough water to operate
Allow for catching up on the past
As the past catches up on you

Records and numbers boxed up
And left long forgotten until now
Footnotes and messages
Too boring but to the one's who care

Water here, water there
And water none at all
The never ending search
For plentiful irrigation
To feed the masses

Trying to piece together puzzles from the past
Numbers of droughts and floods
With no way I have found to find the next
And oh how I've tried

Flood control always
In the back of my mind
Thrown to the forefront
With each passing storm
And with each passing spring melt

How to spread water
Without causing damage
When it comes down hard on ya

Control
A silly term when land is flooding
Anything but

Flood minimizing is a term better suited
For something unwanted
And prayed for at the same time
As the well's pumps trickle to a sputter and cough

One wishes for a well oiled machine
Gleaming silvery at the heart of work's engine

But when the rain is falling
And the chaos is pushing at you
Downhill
Churning with limbs and matted leaves
Trees and tumbleweeds
All coming your way to plug up the works
The well oiled backhoe
Is off making other holes for waters to flow
And has left you low and wet
Instead of high and dry

This is what we've prayed for right?
For the mountain peaks
To send their deluges to our doorsteps?

Control the chaos the world cries out
But is that really the mountain's way?
No, mountain's got it's own way

Minimize the damage and move on to the next
For the mountains will always be there