They tell me that my children
will fall to fire and acid rain
and that greed is the sword
by which we are slain.
My heart, a frail organ,
falters, again and again,
a rattle that rises, creeping,
clawing its way out of its cage,
cutting into creaking lungs
that labor in shallow staccato.
Outside, smoke crawls across
the skyline of a city
I thought my escape, eating
at the edges of my eyes
and calling campfires to mind.
There have been so many nights
where tears that saw a sunset
saw it rise again in glory,
still in some disbelief
that survival was in the cards.
There is a garden I know,
on a hill by the sea,
a place of pilgrimage
and quiet reverence.
Some time ago, a Carpenter
knelt among living trees,
untouched by the plane or lathe,
head bowed and knees buried
in soil stained with shed sweat.
He asked then for another cup,
knowing the cross to come, the dead
wood from which He would hang
to heal the wounds of the world.
When the answer came, He wept.
When the guards came, He went.