Wednesday, June 28, 2017

Still

Still

Grass grows up
from shadowed soil
past sinking treads
and into the mechanisms,
following thin paths
of sunlight,
twisting past belts
and linkages.
Seals dehydrate
and crack,
returning petroleum
to the earth.
Live ammunition
bleeds black powder
from corroded
holes in their skin.
The barrels
bend under heat
and humidity
toward fertile mud.
Reeds engulf time,
leaving creatures
to detour 
around the mass.

Robert L. Jackson III

This poem was inspired by the Midweek Motif of War and Peace by Poets United:




9 comments:

  1. So powerful, your poem leaves me with a vision: May nature dismantle what we build to pervert her out there and in us. May the only instruments of destruction be relegated to museums.

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  2. Wow you made your words so visible Very powerful

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  3. I like the idea of the reeds and grasses covering over all of our disasters.

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  4. Love the idea of nature growing around a "dead" weapon. This image is so alive in my mind. Thank you for that!

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  5. Wonderful visuals play around here. Love the image of growth and Nature covering everything throwing human folly into remote past.

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  6. Wow! This is very vivid Rob. It remind me of The haiku classic -

    Ah! Summer grasses!
    All that remains
    Of the warriors’ dreams

    by Matsuo Bassho 1644-1694
    Translated by: R. H. Blyth, 1952


    Much love...

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  7. I like the imagery that nature overtakes the remnants of making war.

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