trees sunk in dolor as i teach
what i could to the flowers and what they
might say to me in seismic lunges
of dark upon quivering fig
   will tremble the environs.

the boughs mimic the serious mien
of sundials — men have forgotten
the primitive yet go rushing murderous
waving bayonets claiming the silence,
  the ruin rising above the phalanx.

my glyptic words rise above the foliage
telling all macabre presses against
choked light. the heron,
  the  nightingale, o'er there yonder
hills tryingly enunciating something
   in the hollow: they have traded
us for mere soil.