Speaking For The Trees

• Kathryn Fisher, Grade 12
• Poetry
• 2021

People like to talk for us for they think we have no voice,
But silence is a gift of ours so that we may listen well with manic,
To coloured facts as you fight over us, believing there’s no choice.
But to be blind and deaf to each other’s words in a frenzied, fevered panic.
My wilted leaves, they hang in sorrow for the earth has all but died.
No responsibility, no brotherhood, no banding of belief,
Nothing but a blaming game and a wilful selfish pride
This more than all the wrong will be the cause of our defeat.
For if marching and awareness is the best that you can do,
The back and forth of argument between groups with words intended to insult,
The controversy that causes frustration with those who do not share your view
Where there should be no controversy, it is simple. YOU ARE ALL AT FAULT!!
But if you’d only learn to hold your tongue and listen you would see
That perhaps in this darkest hour it is yet still not too late,
To forgo your money, your motives, your pride and maybe listen to a tree
…maybe, but I doubt you will, and so you seal our fate.