A Leaf of Plot

Death raised his scythe on high
The Final Answer was at hand
No more questions broached
No replies begged or risked demand

The leaf at last let it all go
Fluttered to its demise below
The wind added its sighed contempt
Blew our leaf scuttering to a future undreamt

Down the path with attention rapt
A 17-nothing wrought prose off the rack
Laurie screamed—the leaf brushed her face!
Characterization blanched: there’d be no turning back

A writer in a Nature, freed of pretense
Her plot thickened and made Total Sense
Death winced scurrilously and not too haughty
17-nothing conjured twists bland and who knows—naughty?

The wind richened and hurried our protagonists along:
A dead leaf and a fallowed teenager trying to catch the song

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