From the cottage in the dingle,
From the mansion on the knoll
Come the angry whirring shingles
Filled with madness in their soul.

From the boarding house of Molly
And the old Victorian bawd
Up they rise, no use a brolly,
Heavy, wind-worn, sharp and broad

Shingles in their hundreds flying
Like a storm of angry crows,
Striking people, wounded, dying,
How they choose them, heaven knows.

Suddenly the storm is over!
Whirlwinds die with calm aloof
And the shingles, in their hundreds
Each returns to his own roof.

Roofs again made whole and sturdy,
Brown of shake or asphalt black,
Soon this day will be forgotten
'Til the next shingles attack!

Calypso Merriwhether Johnston, Junior
Idaho for the Company and other Poems
Witless and Furbare, Pocatello, 1989