The Leaf’s Revenge Poem by C Richard Miles

Passing traffic ignores
Temporary patchwork quilts
Of quercus, fagus and acer
Interlocked in death-throes
Upon rough tarmac.

Sullenly, battered bodies
Are rudely, roughly squashed,
Squandered autumn’s beauty
Crushed by sheer ignorance
Of engineered steel.

But, even at the last,
Hurt leaves, in sweet revenge,
Gain the ascendancy
With the sudden squeal
Of pain from aching brakes.

Tormentors slide to doom
In gut-wrenching collision,
As metal is gashed apart.
Vanquishers are vanquished,
Softness subduing strength.