Robin Neidorf
LEAVE NO TRACE
the full moon rises in the cleft ……………………………between rock and green-turning-
gold on gravel trails twenty miles ……………………..northwest of this circle of stones
today’s bootprints start to erode
under those traces lie yesterday’s
…………………………… …………………………… …………lower still are strata dyed maroon and olive
then grey again
each line demarcates a slow disaster
ninety-five percent of species gone in the blink
…………………………… …………………………… ………of a few million years
…………………………… ……………………………… …………………………..the glaciers are receding
…………………………… …………………………… ……………………………..the data do not lie
………………………….. ……………………………………….. ………………….each season frees
another era’s liquid
………………………….. ………and debris
………………………….. …………………………..once rock met
………………………….. …………………………………………………..rock and hove       upwards now
every raindrop makes its choice
…………………………south to delta silts         ^^     west to crashing waves and saturated sunsets
take one breath
…………………………….another
the owl’s wings beat          no soundwaves     glacial pond’s surface still as fossil
come December will we remember
how to read…………………. across the gaps in the record…………….to extract
this September evening
bonfire sparks snapping carbon
-scented smoke following the half-missed…………. swoop of a dusk hunt
……………………………………………………….D-chord
…………………………………………………………………………..fades
just one
breath
more
Robin Neidorf started a love affair with poetry via (of all things) a sestina after more than two decades of focusing primarily on creative nonfiction. Her work has been published on the blogs of Best American Poetry, TC Jewfolk, Postpartum, and Matter Press. She lives in Minnesota and actually prefers its winters to its summers.
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