Treehugger’s Lament
Lament 1. n. a passionate expression of grief; elegy. 2. v.i. & t. Utter 1. (for, over); express or feel grief about, be distressed at, (p.p.) mourned for
This whaling
of trees/flailing harpoons as/
the pines take a dive/then flensing/the machines/
the shrieks & the chains/furrowing ruts
dragging/ & the squealing hoists
apathetic, smoking/
It’s all about the machines
/blasting cores/automated botanicide
spasmodic earthworms & despair of the doves
Politician comments/”those Giant Sequoias- they all look alike”/
It’s all about the pulp
/the Ancients trembling/naked, exposed stumps bleeding
sap/
It’s all about the paper
explode/the severed connections/raining particles
/heaving mounds of discarded limbs
& the smell, the smell
/oil/gas/sweat/sap/green death death death
It’s not about the trees
/in the eerie silence/hands clapped to ears
/their voicelessness/is deafening
[this is a work in progress]
