Poem Eleven: Redwood

An emergency situation declaration designates 112,646,000 acres, or 59% of all national forest lands, as a priority for immediate logging. 

*

Tell me your secrets

and I will tell you mine.

You are a medium,

prophet-maker, preacher.

Can I put my ear

against your chest?

Your heart a drum 

beneath the bark. 

Your roots speak

in mantras, benedictions, 

Nirvana, the Holy Grail.

Who is listening?

The amulets of your leaves 

sound alarm.

Speak, portend, pray, 

bear witness.

Who is listening?

Who will hold their palms

out firmly 

to say stop?  

Who will hold the earth

beneath your feet?

You are gods, ancestors,

oracles.

Who will forgive us 

for our trespasses?

We wake 

and fall asleep.

Make us into wood.  

Make us into canoes.

We will go timeless 

without you.

*

Poem Eleven: Redwood
Call and Response for the Forest

(For three or more voices or group/solo alternation)

This is not written by me but translated creatively by AI, wow.

LEADER:
Tell me your secrets,

RESPONSE (ALL):
And we will tell you ours.

LEADER:
You are a medium.
You are a prophet.
You are a preacher.
You are a prayer.

ALL:
We are listening.

LEADER:
Can I put my ear
to your chest?

ALL:
We are listening.

LEADER:
Your heart is a drum.
Your roots speak in mantras,
benedictions, Nirvana,
the Holy Grail.

ALL:
We are listening.
But are we hearing?

LEADER:
Your leaves are amulets.

ALL:
They sound the alarm.

LEADER:
Your boughs speak,
portend, pray,
bear witness.

ALL:
We are listening.

LEADER:
Who will hold out their hands
and say—

ALL (with rising force):
Stop.

LEADER:
Who will hold the earth
beneath your feet?

ALL:
We will hold.
We will hold.

LEADER:
You are gods.
You are ancestors.
You are oracles.

ALL:
You are not ours to take.
You are not ours to burn.

LEADER:
Who will forgive
our trespasses?

ALL:
Only the forest.
Only time.

LEADER:
We wake.
We sleep.
We wake.
We sleep.

ALL (softly):
We forget.
We forget.

LEADER:
Make us into wood.
Make us into canoes.
Make us into memory
that floats.

ALL (rising together):
We will go timeless without you.
We will go rootless without you.
We will go lost without you.

ALL (soft, closing whisper):
You are sacred.
Let the ceremony begin.