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Another May Day
May Day but no maypole here
trees cut down as soon as they have budded
like young virgins unfrocked
ravaged
destroyed
bleeding blue guns like menses’ first blood
deflowered, rights
which come with new customs and governing
rights claimed though all was in common
if not taken by them, then others
officers, uniforms
bargaining without fear of criminality
no thought of future beyond the year
this season’s pocket and purse.
For charcoal burning
without desire beyond this midday,
morning’s broken promises,
acts at dawn or late at night
when saws and trucks and axes
desecrate a fast-changing landscape
forest disappearing
leaving scars and grizzled whiskers
where once songs sang,
earth left flowing down hillsides, calling creatures lost
outside game-parks where tourists and romantics go
to see wild animals, reimported
on backs of trucks
across bare land.
From 'Counting the Chiperoni' (Ginninderra Press, 2020)
