Lament for a Creek

It is a specific kind of sickness

to purchase land riotous with life

and raise a blade

where the root firms the worm

between tree and current

where the reed screens the mantis

as she prays

there is so little left to say

about undoing

all this losing

the fringe of things that sing

with spore and dew

I did not witness the way

your beds were spread

bulldozer pushing straight in

only feel the violence deep

under my skin.