past the parking lot and the helpful signs
there is tangle and breaking apart
river surging thru all those jazz notes
some nicely dressed people noticing
their blacktop manners succumbing to bush
needing a field guide to say the names
the tree, gnarled and wide, easy with the sky
it’s long-ago siblings lost to mast and beam
a hiker stops as if to count into the bark
trace back lost centuries of working
cutting, sweat making the valley human
mistakes were made, this one missed
the path knows our feet too well
red, magenta, purple, punch up from mud
working around our cleat-marks
our kind invasions of this valley
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Published in A complete handbok for survival in the urban wilds Cactus Press 2009
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