Walking Up to School

I saw a fig this morning,
Red meat exposed,
Dark, mottled skin peeled back.
A burst of crimson against
The gray backdrop of asphalt.
Splattered by a car.
Sad, I thought.
What a waste of good fruit.
My eyes focused,
Lamenting this loss,
And I saw the crimson burst was no exposed meat,
But a red mouth,
Opened in a scream of terror,
And the dark mottled flesh
Was not that of fruit
But of lizard,
And my stomach buckled
And I turned my eyes away,
Walking up to school.

~ by scriken on May 4, 2009.