Sometimes, for the 'good' of all, some aspects of nature have to be destroyed, no matter how long they have been growing. It is natural, and it is a shame. And, if you're watching, it's heart-breaking.
Old, proud and strong
And up our trees grew
Limbs outward and trunks upward
And roots the ground through
And birds perched high up in their branches
Screeching lullabies thick with truth
And things scurried about their bottoms
Picking and scavenging, hands full of fruit
But now do you hear the popping
Soft + far away?
Can you hear them breaking
Moaning as they sway?
Limbs spread out
Heavy with wet + decay
They know you can tell
And they bow themselves in shame
And twist in the wind
Crying as they break
And be swift as you run
For there is no place to stay
And can you hear the birds
Calling out as they fly?
They lack places to sit + sing
Finding only places to die
And all the little things
Stepping about your feet in your flight
Lack a place to sleep
Or a place to hide
And now the snapping resounds
All around your head
“Now where are you going?,”
Sing out the dead
From their suburbs + strip malls
“To put your kind,” you respond, “to bed.”
And so the path becomes thick with limbs
By the time the sun rises on a world
Colder than the life that preceded this dark
The life that had brought the birds their bread
And allowed the Sparrows to sing
The hunter now a farmer instead
And they land among the stumps
Unsure of how to lark
And they cry and they sway
And you stand amidst the branches
Only their stories for company
And wonder how to push forward
Or why
And the snapping has stopped
Leaving no life, only the sway
Of the branches you remember
That grew up through the sky
Patchworking overhead, framing the stars
Now lying, burning, in a funeral fire
Rubsam '08
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