The greening mountains

What was once here is now gone.
Those nights I knew nothing of the real story
I just loved the gleam on the mountains
as if thousands of lights were turned on for a feast.

Each light was a flaming tree.
Each night another strip of the mountain was set alight,
the fire tightening like a belt:
into the deepest wrinkles it went, leaving nothing but ashes.

My father knew. His grief was endless at the sight.
My parents whispered to each other about these things.
I was kept in the dark about what they thought.

The trees were guilty
of making this landscape a little cooler and more beautiful.
They were guilty of becoming a resting place
for the men who only came down at night.

Fifteen years later here I am
in this house which has lost its past,
has no resemblance to what it is.
I have the same view of the mountain.

Now the trees are growing back.
Soon they will cover the mountains again.

Copyright © 2005 Choman Hardi All rights reserved
from Life for Us
Bloodaxe Books/Dufour Editions
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission