Past the Construction, Where the Forest Once Stood

Hills of red and rain, running
dark as dirt, longing for all the life
that had kept them buried, beneath
tangled roots and desperate leaves.

Dark clouds—like smoke leftover
from the long-ago burns—
curl over gaping ground, feed
an earth that does not remember.

Weeping comes to the hills
as easy as rain, turning them
into an oil painting of ochre and carmine
streaks, vermillion bursts; but only the sky
bears vantage, witness to this accidental art
of abstraction.

The men, working, dig deep—tremble
the once-forest like grit
until their man-made pearl is unearthed.

The guarded, neat rows
of yet-unplanted saplings
will birth no forests.

Rebecca Ruvinksy
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