Elegy for Ragged Mountain Reservoir

They need no fences. The smell is enough

to ward off curious hikers, teens throbbing
to trespass,
                        most wildlife.

Chemicals        threaded through soil, grease
and gasoline—
              beneath it all                 a rotting churns

the silence.        Not the empty throat
of a mortuary hallway:
              the after hush,
both casket and cargo motionless.

Only the odor walks. To the dead
no more evil can be done

              we tell ourselves
in a darkness streaked
with motor oil.

Above felled trees,
                            hulking flanks
of machinery carve
their yellow silhouettes.

Backhoe loader. Chain-flail delimber.

One machine: a claw like the mouth
on a creature with no face.

No penance in song or songlessness—
              the water
              molders treebody        into flesh.

                            Even the night sky
holds its breath.              Not a word
from the broken bells of the stars.