ODE TO EARTH

Watched them today,

A flock of Cockatoos

Egregiously loud, self-assured conversationalist,

One with Earth, Specks of white in Green

Green; the epitaph of peace,

The longing that it evokes,

Of tranquil spaces and travel

Journeys to the bellies of civilization and people

Eking a living off forests

Forest; the rustic sounds of the trees,

The furtive wind, the gnarled roots, and the long-abandoned honeycombs

The path forlorn but the one they thread,

A band of women, foraging sticks from the forest floor,

Bare hands with crevices browned with soil,

Soil; the dark brown matter,

Matted feet and young bodies,

Emerging from quicksand's after a hunt,

Fresh crabs from the wet forest floor,

Another day of the hunter not hunted,

Another day of brown,

Waiting on the red,

Red, the aching burning earth,

The barren land, the burnt forest stumps, the putrid wind,

Red, the flames of the forest fire,

Edging closer to the epitaph of green

Flights of treason, the flock of white,

Abandoning their self-assured right,

Watch them with my eyes closed,

Convulsing in my dream,

Of a vision lost,

Of specks of White in the colour Green.