Poem: Aftermath

 

Aftermath

 

in a forest as cursed as brittle bones, 

trunks of the motherless 

lay supine near laughing geese,

while wind combs

a paper-birch bark of shivered curls,

howlsome in its error.

 

i kneel,

touching the fresh fissures

in the failed elderly resistance.

how did this centenarian wood

resist for so long before a cracked face

stretched forth across its own midsection, 

only to leer, shredded rictus sharp--

leer up at the storm

which splintered to savage?

============

7/8/24 ...

World's on the brink of war, Russia into Ukraine.  Could be the last.

Beware the fascist, authoritarian macho.

5/15  "resistance" replaces "wood"

5/15 "the octogenarian wood" replaces "it"