The Deadly Huddle

Following the crowd is deadly sometimes

Feeding the cows was easy in the pasture.

The fence around the haystack

Let cows stick their necks through

To eat to their hearts content.

Within a week or so, the once mounded stack

Looked more like a big mushroom

The fence could be moved two or three times

Before tearing it down forming it back

And the cycle would start again.

We were quite fond of our dairy cows

Each had a name

And a stall

The farm was never quite the same

After this summer nights fall

The storm roared across the plain

The cattle pushed in closer

The barn wouldn’t hold them all

So they had to fend in the pasture

Dust spattered with rain

Drove them against the breaking fence

Thunder pushed them further in

Under the mushroom hay

When lightening hit and ignited the stack

You’d think they’d run away

They stayed.

It was fearful to cross that blackened ground

For many years thereafter

Bones and ash were all we found

We never milked another cow.