The Shadow

The Shadow
I hide in the darkness and come out in daylight.
I can be seen when the great sun shines bright.
I can shape myself like anything and become anyone,
Yet I feel I lack a purpose, being what I have become.
Do you know what I am?  Just take a guess.
I’m a dark shadow, and I’m in such a mess.
I didn’t always used to be this way;
I could live in both night and day.
For it ‘twas my own foul doing that made
Me a prisoner of forever-dawning dark haze,
And made me the shadow I’d be for the rest of my days.
Let me tell you how this unfortunate circumstance engulfed my tear-filled life,
‘Twas not my own tears but the tears of the others that I caused to have strife.
I once walked this dull inhabitance people call earth in a human form,
I did not know other humans’ strife would become my own storm.
You see, I was a jokester.  I loved to pull pranks.
I’d stick tacks under chairs and pin people to planks.
I had an irresistible urge to cause strife,
If only I knew I’d become a shadow without a life.
One day, I was sitting down in Miss Harpen’s class,
I sat there, staring at her, with hateful feelings that wouldn’t pass.
I despised her from the black depths of my heart,
She was always mocking me, just tearing me apart.
She would sit upright on her chair like a masculine fat hog on alert,
She didn’t realize with every taunt of hers just how bad inside I would hurt.
I would sometimes laugh aloud in class, thinking of all the things
I could do to her big, pasty face.
She would ask me, “What’s so funny?”
And I’d answer, “Oh, Miss Harpen, just thinking of a funny place.”
Funny, funny place, how fun it would be.
Suddenly, I got an idea, a nasty idea to the foulest degree.
That day after class I left with a smile,
I even opened the door for my teacher and said, “I’ll see you in a while.”
As she walked away, I said one last thing to the hog,
“Hey, be careful, it’s hard to see in this thick fog.”
Indeed, for days, there had been a thick fog lurking around in sight,
It was perfect for what I was about to create tonight.
I stole a shovel from an old, worn out shed, and hastened back to the schoolhouse,
Funny thoughts still racing in my head.
Quickly but cautiously, I started digging a pit, and guess who it was for,
My dear teacher, the twit.
As I worked, I felt sweat drip down my brow,
Miss Harpen would regret what she said to me now.
After a couple of hours, I had another chore to do,
As I walked through the never-ending fog, my hatred for her grew.
For what I obtained next, it is a surprise,
But to give you a hint, it’s what she looks like through my eyes.
The next day the sun rose as it usually does,
And the bees swarmed around with a particular buzz.
Hiding behind a tree, I saw my teacher walk towards the schoolhouse door,
Unaware of what was in store.
As she reached for the handle, she didn’t see the huge pit because of the heavy fog,
And suddenly fell, into my surprise, twenty, wild, hogs.
She hit the cold, hard ground, and as they trampled over her,
Made a screaming sound.
I came out from behind the tree and laughed with uncontrolled joy,
The teacher didn’t realize what was coming from a little boy.
I laughed so hard as I walked over to the pit’s edge,
When suddenly, I heard a crack from the ledge!
As I fell, I thought this would be my horrible demise!
“Anything would be better than this!” I cried.
Then, in an instant, a higher power than humans came into my view.
He spoke, “You will be sentenced to the life of a shadow
For all the horrible things you decided to do.”
Now, whenever someone is about to do something wrong, I bet,
They’ll see their own corrupt shadow and have feelings of regret.
And so, I bet you didn’t see,
That this is the way all shadows came to be.