Poems by Rebecca Lawton
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Arbor Day
by Rebecca Lawton
From Canary Spring 2022
A younger Rebecca guided thousands of people through the Colorado River watershed on lands of the Navajo, Hopi, and others. She writes now from Sonoma Creek watershed, homeland of the Miwok, Ohlone, and Pomo.
We plant late in the day
and pray for rain
to cool the night
We dream of things we loved
Those lost in an instant:
our stepmother’s breath
the neighbor boy who fell from his roof
Neither here to face the hot days
to come, though they wanted to
Those lost over time:
bees thinned out of hives
honeysuckle dry in the sun
the foxes who denned here
Still we plant our seedlings
Slip them with hope into soil
to tend the rest of our days
Dig them in well for generations
Open our soft-earth burrows for some future
return
© Rebecca Lawton