Kansas, Old Abandoned House
 
House, weathered, bashed in grays, spiders,
homespun surrounding yellows and pinks
on a Kansas, prairie appears lonely tonight.
The human theater lives once lived here
inside are gone now,
buried in the back, dark trail
behind that old outhouse.
Old wood chipper in the shed, rustic, worn, no gas, no thunder, no sound.
Remember the old coal bin, now open to the wind, 
but no one left to shovel the coal.
Pumpkin patches, corn mazes, hayrides all gone.
Deserted ghostly children still swing abandoned in the prairie wind.
All unheated rooms no longer have children
to fret about, cheerleaders have long gone,
the banal house chills once again, it is winter,
three lone skinny crows perched out of sight
on barren branched trees silhouetted in early morning
hints of pink, those blues, wait with hunger strikes as winter
that snow starts to settle in against moonlight skies.
Kansas becomes a quiet place when those first snowfalls.
There is the dancing of the crows−
that lonely wind, that creaking of the doors, no oil in the joints.

Michael Lee Johnson lived ten years in Canada during the Vietnam era and is a dual citizen of the United States and Canada.  Today he is a poet, freelance writer, amateur photographer, and small business owner in Itasca, DuPage County, Illinois. Mr. Johnson published in more than 1098 new publications, and his poems have appeared in 40 countries, he edits, publishes ten poetry sites. Michael Lee Johnson has been nominated for 2 Pushcart Prize awards poetry 2015/1 Best of the Net 2016/2 Best of the Net 2017, 2 Best of the Net 2018.  Two hundred seventeen poetry videos are now on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/user/poetrymanusa/videos. Editor-in-chief poetry anthology, Moonlight Dreamers of Yellow Haze:  http://www.amazon.com/dp/1530456762; editor-in-chief poetry anthology, Dandelion in a Vase of Roses available here https://www.amazon.com/dp/1545352089. 

Editor-in-chief Warriors with Wings:  The Best in Contemporary Poetry, http://www.amazon.com/dp/1722130717.

https://www.amazon.com/Michael-Lee-Johnson/e/B0055HTMBQ%3Fref=dbs_a_mng_rwt_scns_share

https://www.lulu.com/shop/search.ep?keyWords=Michael+Lee+Johnson&type=.  Member Illinois State Poetry Society:  http://www.illinoispoets.org/

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