This Ravaged Country

Below the tracks trees grow askew,
sickly soft and twisted
from sulfur dioxide and toluene and benzene and lead.
Roots exposed,
becoming unmoored from what was once beautiful,
now ravaged,
straining to break free,
like teeth in an old man’s mouth
or a dying dog’s.

Rheumy eyed
beyond all hope of redemption,
this land is doomed.

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