INTO THE WOODS

Poem for Today - May 22, 2014

THE FOREST LAST DAY

death comes at the end of the chain saw

with spears of shrieks that split the air and red of the sun

biting into  the flesh of wood

that is shocked by the sudden pain and alien din.

its world overturns all, strange as fainting

sap flowing, its essence denying the steel’s

base and supporting roots trembling

In its canopy birds will play

its air made fragrant by the essence of the forest

the sky is witness with clear eyes.

fallen is the cengal

  fallen is the meranti

    fallen is the merbau

      fallen is the pulai

fallen is the seraya

   fallen is the nyatuh

            fallen is the resak

fallen is the halban

                       fallen is the nibung

                          fallen is the rattan

a family of trees aged by the centuries

the beautiful and great lying in the shadow

with a presence in the root’s fibers and shoot’s sway.

heat rushes into the air tunnel, existence is scalded.

the wheel of nature turns slowly

listening to the rhythm of the season and the sun

With a sense of presence in the roots and the sway of the shoots

after the death shatter and scatter of roots

heat rushes into the tunnel, searing existence.

morning-purple flowers fall

as red as cliffs, as white as cloud, as brown as trunks.

buds and fruits on heavy branches fall

lire dotted near the stem or full with the seasons

a universe of colors falls

a hundred stripes of green painting the leaves' personalities

the moon falls, caught by the branches

as light that sketches difference,

morning falls, the afternoon and the night.

with the rustle, tenderness drips from shoots

the secret mist of nature evaporates

the frame of balance is broken, since trees became earth

the quiet beauty filtered by light fades away,

leaves are dumb, branches speechless, no song, no echo

no deer, no baboon, no elephant herd

no pulse of mouse deer’s bleat,  no question.

the full epic of the forest

is ended by a convoy of lorries with tyres of concrete,

a gang of paid lumberjacks who wear no pity in their eyes.

and a bloated logger

who stands on the red desiccated desert

our future.

© Muhammad Haji Salleh -  

Translated from the Malay

 by the author