Broken Bricks

I hope that I’m not here

when the last factory falls.

I know the evidence

of our civilization,

spray paint on brick,

dusty novels in public libraries,

sweetly sincere hellos and

I love you’s will all return

to dust again, but

I hope that I’m not there

when Ohio abandons itself, and

West Virginia blasts its last

mountain top, and the final PA

steel mill crumbles into rust.

I hope that I’m here with you

when the last factory falls

and we tell each other stories

of the things we once built,

as the sun suggests

some new growth

in broken bricks.

Trees

The trees in my neighborhood are falling.

I don’t see it as a good sign.  First,

there was a giant oak in Rufus’ backyard,

just south, went down in a windstorm.

Then, a few weeks ago, Bob cut down

a 30 foot pine because it was dropping

more needles this year, then limbs.

Soon the rotting pin oak toward the sunset

will fall by wind or axe and we’ll

hopefully dodge it, but what is inescapable

is the collapse of our forest around us.

Already the sky seems too wide,

almost frightening.  This is not Kansas.

And when that next tree goes, and the sky

splits wide open in all directions,

I will be haunted by a sinking feeling,

or the ghosts of all these trees.

Gamble

Megan gave me a penny.

She said she found it
on the floor heads up.

I have no way of knowing
if she is telling the truth.

I'll take my chances.