by Linda Siebenga
does creation cringe at our coming
does it see us at a distance
with the tools to permanently scar its face
with no healing balm to fix the gouges
we have scraped
the forests we have shaved off the mountains
til there are no roots to hold the soil
that erodes into the valleys
does creation cringe at our coming
as we squeeze and push it each year
to give up all its nutrients
never letting it catch its breath
never letting it have a sabbath
a time of renewing
does creation cringe at our coming
when the axe fells all the roadside trees
the ones that stretched their fingertips
to the heavens in the purpling evening sky
the ones that cradled nests in their outstretched arms
and caught the wind between fields of topsoil
does creation cringe at our coming
when we mask its surface in chalky concrete
block by block section by section
advancing like the slowest arms
the deadliest predator of the best farmland
that grew the food we ate yesterday
* Linda Siebenga is a CPJ member living on a dairy farm west of Lacombe, Alberta. The title of the poem came from a speech by Calvin DeWitt.
