THE WAR YEARS

I should have expected this – the disfigurement of the red-berried holly and pitch pine woodland into snarled tree roots and orange fill dirt. This was a place to bathe in the song of chickadees, breathe in the evergreen laden air, a place like the greenwood that surrounded Verdun. After 300 days of steady bombardment, the land was given a new name – Zone Rouge. Nature was expected to heal its wounds. Aren’t there some things dirt drenched in blood can’t reclaim? Nguyen Hien remembers the moment a hoe hit a bomb in his friend’s garden when he licks the two fingers left on his right hand. And when his wife caresses the bumps of shrapnel embedded in the back of his neck. My lawn cleared of fall’s debris reveals tunnels and mole holes. Once again I begin my campaign of dropping poison pellets in each exit.

Earth Day 2022 Moonstone Press