And the Land Wept

Roberta Shellum Dohse

May 30, 2022

The thunder cracked and split the sky

and roared across the plain.

The lightning struck and split the rock

and nothing was the same.

The shelf of rock it cracked apart

and splintered as it flew —

far, over the edge of the world.

And the land wept 

for the loss

of such a piece of itself.

Roberta Shellum Dohse hails primarily from California. After living on a farm in northern Minnesota and in Oregon, she moved to Texas in 1980, attended law school, and has practiced law in Corpus Christi since 1997. Formerly a flight instructor and a college professor, she has always loved to write.