Leaving Traces

leaving traces
that will outlive the trees

the upheaval we are laying upon the land

is burying our thoughts enough
suppressing our minds
in the feeling it will never change the world
even if we know that is only
only if we fail
fail to find all the others that are just like us

but knowing there are numbers and finding them
are so different
so different

will I leave a mark that outlasts these trees
or even just the one tree I planted in my own backyard
will the future dwellers here on this land
just look and curse the shade in the fog
and embrace it in the sun
knowing nothing of the soil I dug
to bury its still living roots

surely they won't find the box
the wood, cloth and fabric that went in with those roots
now in the trunk and mulch of leaves
rounded many seasons over

I look and know
and maybe do my children
but we rarely last beyond

and not that I want to
but I want all to live
as though they are are trying to
and less of all this just surviving
what a world it could be

what a world it could be if all were living
for a legacy and not to survival
a real legacy not coins 

if I could find
and others could find
and were driven to find
all the ways to be better
and all the ways to live the long right, not the fast and short
to protect this land not just write a history we want told
to but to live as bricks for the future we want to tell it