In this narrow valley
We are surrounded
Smokestacks stand like Indians
An assembly of whisperers
Their stories stated and immediately stolen
Taken by the relentless wind
Through the heart of it
The lifeblood of the land
Runs out westward to mingle
Once again with Mother Ocean
To be subsumed
To be welcomed home
Across the straits
The hills stand silent much as they did
One hundred years ago
A thousand?
Twenty thousand?
Surely not a million
On these shores
The shell mounds of the Karkin are lost
Covered by condominiums, the latest in a parade of indignities
From here you could walk out on the water a fair distance
Keeping those hills in sight, but I wouldn’t
At least not barefoot
Was it always like this?
Do we stand on the mired remains
Of gentle granite giants
Washed down from the interior
Or are we merely caught in an eddy
Of slack tide and time?
Photo/Ray Larsen
Román Leão 
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