The Year of the Dragon

I initially wrote this poem 12 years ago, and it's as applicable today in this Year of the Dragon as it was then. The only difference is that California's the state I decided upon.   

The Year of the Dragon

Fireflies patrol the woods

like members of a signal corps.

But, as of now, no hint

of a fire-spewing dragon

despite dragonflies dining lakeside.

This is not to say

one may not be slumbering

off the old logging road

grown brittle with underbrush.

The lightening of July jumping

the horizon, August's heat

pushing it forward,

and his beast of a brother

already stomping through California

with an eye to other states,

his greedy breath licking mountains 

of forested land.

Marilyn Aschoff Mellor