Burning and clearing

We went looking for the moon in dough

stars in batter morals in glitter

but the bats at rest

resent being woken and the owls that speak

aloof to the valley repealed

our requests for information.

The forest doesn’t speak to us, and that is

natural, to keep its counsel for life

that refuses what it sees to be seen; it knows

the alternative is burning and clearing.

We are still allowed to be here,

no defeat undermines us, if we take

the view that cracks open

our mortality, slides it in

among the striations

of everything that once burned

out, serving the national interest.  We hold

hands, pull each other up the sand

bank, taser the look-out; we are all

talk and laughing and waggling, eating down

to the roots, reading and marking our way

with strips of red and yellow scalded into the bark.

We’re looking for something here that heaven

knows we already have, in the cellars

made by driving

out the animals: it’s enough to last

us until we become trees or rock

ourselves to the speechless amity

of rootless sleep.  I love you more

than I know to say. Make your choice

at the trailhead, the branchline inviting you

to drown or breathe in the green sea,

nothing will tell you

if you are right

to forget what is lost in not choosing but

we will all come with you, driving forward

with sticks, pressing

the earth with different hands.