Ode to the Pothole
Oh, pothole, how devious you are!
In youth, you are unnoticeable and hardly felt under the suspension of our advanced vehicles. At first, you do little more than gnaw our tires. Our course remains undeterred and our conscience unmarred. You are present without presence. You, pothole, are but an acquaintance to be forgotten.
You grow in girth and in depth. Your rubber appetite is becoming unquenchable. Drivers avoid you like it is a game. For now, you are avoidable, but nonetheless, our cars are built to sustain your bite when necessary. We know of you, heard your name. On a clear day, people evade you easily. You are hungry and patiently waiting for your accomplice: the rain.
Under torrential rain, you wait under puddle, to claw at each unfamiliar driver. You grow deeper with each strike, too, like gossip, adding fuel to your fire! You are indiscernible among both pounding rain and sunny aftermath. You hide like a chameleon, reflecting the world around you when filled, your most dangerous state. Feast while opportune, pothole, because when you become well-known, you become problematic. Then, the war begins.
We patch your gaping jaws, but you know it is temporary. The next rain or freeze has all the potential to un-gag you, rip the tape from your mouth. Rain equals wrath and the longer it rains, the longer you eat. Enjoy.
Ironically, man built the roads you infest. Construction neglect and failure to know the porous soil beneath roadways are your loopholes. We indulge you with asphalt patchwork on which you gleefully feed. You are a weed, unable to be nipped in the bud, a recurring nightmare, a cicada outside the bedroom window.
We cover you, again and again, but you will never cease to exist, as long as red tape barricades solutions, as long as you are economically unviable to repair correctly, and as long as rain falls on this green earth.
In other words, until the planet dries up, you will forever plague our streets.
By: S. Cole Garrett
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