Mass Graves
There isn't a mass grave in my neighborhood
a creek has never flooded
(there is no creek, after all)
and bones have not surfaced.
A bulldozer never grinds to a halt
stayed by a smiling white skull.
The driver doesn’t jump down
doesn’t sift through the remains
kneeling there on the plot.
I once found a grey limb
jutting out from a hill.
I hoped it was a bone
maybe a femur from yore,
the last limb of a virulent Ute
protecting his home—
built by him
with his arms and legs
with the tools of the plains.
His scalp no more,
his skin long gone
but the bone remaining
still staking claim
for the living and free.
But it wasn’t a bone—
it was a tree limb
because there aren’t graves in my neighborhood.
There aren’t even real trees
or game trails;
there aren’t survivors
or failures
let alone corpses and fleas
And the only war left to fight
is against omnipresent me.
Copyright © Nick Hertzog | Year Posted 2010
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