Boston Molasses Disaster

Now I see the molasses, it’s all over town;
all the streets and the sidewalks are sienna brown.
It’s a sad situation of terrible fate;
all of Boston now suffers in one sticky state.

It is mid January in nineteen nineteen,
and I work for the Globe as reporter McQueen.
An explosion sent shock waves exceedingly high;
wounds were many, and twenty one people did die.

There was no rapid flow for molasses takes time;
oozing goo scenic blight panorama in grime.
It pains me that I have to report I confess;
a molasses defeat, one inglorious mess.

So I’m down on the walk—the scene devastates me;
if I take any steps I am no longer free
for molasses grabs hold with unbreakable will…
and today Boston cries from a molasses spill.

The molasses keeps coming albeit real slow;
there’s an eerie sweet feeling yet no status quo.
All the splatter on window panes, lamps and facade
paints an alien messiness transcending odd.

City leaders in government picked up the pace;
monumental the cleaning that they had to face.
But the cleanup demanded that time tick away;
it was slow as molasses on that winter day.


24 Lines
Writer’s Cramp
9-5-19