I am watching shadow patterns

move across the gray roof

of my neighbor’s place,

watching tips of winter trees

begin to show spring’s ochre,

their sharpness go soft, mauve.

I am remembering that today,

driving back roads home, I saw

black swaths of turned earth

ribboning undulating fields

ripe for planting summer wheat.

And I saw jagged, festering cuts,

the serpentine pipes declared safe

for ground water they’ve harmed.

I am watching, remembering,

wondering what will happen

if the hillside’s trees don’t leaf,

if farm fields aren’t fruitful,

if the murmur of the creek

across the road goes silent.

Bonnie Thurston

Bonnie Thurston is an award winning poet who has published a book of West Virginia poems calledA Place to Pay Attention. She lives in Wheeling.