THE FOREST
We are the hosts innumerable who ride Upon the hills—who stride The plains and surge upon the mountainside. We are the onward-sweeping tide Of ceaseless growth, the countless entities Of all the rolling, emerald seas Of timber-land—we are the Trees!
The dam who suckles us is Earth, She gives us birth And when Our night is come, she claims her own again. We live to grow and to this end Recurring seasons lend Their favor; Winter comes, our labors cease, It is a time of cold, white peace; When Spring walks jubilantly through the land We know the hour of increase is at hand; Then stirs our forest-heart and sap runs free— The sap which is the life-blood of a tree. Our skin is bark, and fiber is our flesh And through the pores of every fresh Green leaf, we breathe. Our good? Is to make wood; To hold in check the floods that devastate; To mediate Between the Heavens and the Earth, That there shall be no dearth Of water nor excess—yet still enough Stored in our forest floor of matted duff To save the land from barrenness, And when we tender less Than this, or stop From making wood, we’re dead! In time, we drop, And when we drop, we rot. Such is our lot; our lives are fraught With much vicissitude, not always free To shape our destiny— A tale where each slow-born event Is moulded by environment.
And there is stuff Enough of drama if the rough, Rude story were all told—a stage Where age- Old patriarchs make way For jostling, upstart youth and gay, Bepainted courtezans and those who weep With trailing tears; and anchorites who keep Their solitary trysts; and those who sing; And gossips bent in whispering; Defiant wretches of the sod, Hurling invective at their God; Or those whose arms in priestly-wise Turn supplicating to the skies, Or stoop to bless With benediction and caress; And gnarled hags And misshaped monsters of the crags; And moon-white hosts Of beckoning ghosts.
With wild, spendthrift magnificence The stage is set—immense And primal. Flash And flood and thunder-crash, Devouring flame and scattered dead And silences that hang like lead. Stuff Enough for drama if the rough Rude story were all told; A tale as old As dusk, as new as dawn— The play is always going on— The curtain’s never drawn.