Either ore

The grum of our chapel bell

marks the daily descent.

With bent back creaking

and hand gloved blister-black

we hack out downy riches

from our groaning belly.

Our empires may be mighty

but they're not ours.

There's talk of new buildings

in the next big town

illustrious temples of Commerce.

Ornate, they are, clad in fine carvings

of fruit trees and lush vines.

Our forest leaves for new continents

on saltwashed hulls lined with lung dust

to ward off shipworm.

Our dust is silk-soft;

it cloaks our breath quietly

tucks our child into an early bed

in the stomach of our reckoning.

We weaken the roots among us;

the foliage wilts away.

On a clustered path

settled by lighter feet

they crease their eyes to watch

leaf beetles trundle verdant up trunks

fed by remnants of our compromise:

by the ravage of our lung

the blister of our hand

the bend of our back.