If They Spoke

With many an outstretched hand,

I've stood here for ages.

Braved these storms, but, alas,

You won't read them in your pages.

Your pages -- well, you know from where they spring

Yes, my friend, from my bark -- my own skin.

Yet they do not speak, of how I kept you safe,

Gave you all, a new path to pave.

I saw a brother of mine

Swallow thunder and die.

Then I looked up at the gods above,

I looked them in the eye.

All of my family here, we stay side by side,

Bared to Nature's rage and whims, nowhere to hide...

But we ask for nothing, friends, we are glad to help you so

Why is it that you, good folks, can't see to let us go?

I heard a sister of mine

Yell, as she was stabbed to death by you.

You will never know how much

I wished to yell too.

You didn't hear her screams as your axe ground her waist.

You didn't hear, even when she cried the loudest.

I really don't see how, if the earless one is me,

Why can you not hear the sounds of our agony?

You brought the world to your fingertips,

Well, what pleasure did that give?

You fight among yourselves day and night --

You don't kn

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ow how to live.

Yet to live, you take our lives -- that's right.

You don't care to wait till our tears are dried.

How long? How long? When will you wake up?

How many disasters before you realise your mistake?

For your roads, and your homes,

Your cities and your towns --

As you cut, Mother Nature

Measures ounce by ounce.

The day your sins tip Her scales, She will stir, wait and see;

For every drop of tear you made us shed, you will shed three.

We called you friends, as we call you still,

But you must perceive, you must feel.

One of these days will be my last,

It's not that far, I know it hurts.

But will he who snuffs out my life

Listen to my final words?

I watered your crop and gave you food to eat,

I held with my roots the soil beneath your feet.

Remember me as I turn to ashes in your kitchens,

And promise my children and yours, forests -- vast and dense.

From the tropics to the tundra,

Every life there is,

Stands at the very edge

Of a great abyss

It might not be too late 

To save our clan and kin.

It is a duty to Nature and Her creation,

Not a war to win.