Hollowed wound in pavement’s skin,

a crater carved, then left again,

a half-finished thought of city design,

scraped bare then lost to time.

Each morning I brace for your

jolt and jeer,

your greeting sudden, unwelcome, and severe.

You rattle my tires and jar me awake,

you threaten my tread with the toll you take,

And yet, poor pothole, you have been forsaken still,

a casualty not of time but of man’s will.

You were meant to be sealed, smoothed, and made whole.

Yet plans were abandoned and you fell through a hole.

So who am I to curse your despair,

when the world created and left you without care.

Lonely pothole on my well-worn way,

Forgotten by all (except for me each day).