A Spiritual And Inspirational Poem from All-Creatures.org

The Road to Williamstown By Sam Gold

I remember the torment of the trees,
how their sawdust bodies clutched at the earth,
helpless in their death throes and death,
shattered, felled by human folly.
I remember them bleeding out wood chips
as a final charity,
a charity among the leaves,
as if remembering the once noble life,
neither swank nor festive,
though profluent and green, abounding in breath,
now severed from the fellowship of roots,
the tangled entelechy,
who warned, who nurtured, who loved, who mourned.

I remember how hair-like the descent to mere wood and fear—
the brown and brittle angel hair scattered
everywhere, as emaciated, weeping brush,
the scattered wood chips, the impotent seed,
the descendants of a tortured breed,
the decedents slain by anti-mind and greed.

And yet, in the downcast light where devils leap and scorn,
their deaths, bereft of dignity and wings,
cry out and illuminate and weep with dry tears,
with invisible blood,
"Here we are your tools, we are mere wood."

And angels hear and sigh, "Not so! The earth, thy lees,
will be restored! Let fools be forewarned!"—
while the lifeless bodies hear nothing in the pulvered breeze.
I remember the torment of the trees.

©Sam Gold, 2025

---

Return to Spiritual and Inspirational Poetry