The sugar maples are crimson
among the scarlet Bradford pears,
river birches cascading
golden-green-titian down the silver
bark peeling away from trunks
like the sycamore
where Zaccheus perched aloft.
Rain muddies the river,
flotsam and jetsam piling up
against beavers’ dams, dirty froth
foaming at the mouth, the sickly
scum building up against the sticks
dragged through the forest and over
the rocks, submerged in the soup,
emerging soggily to be shoved into a crevice, attempting to stop a whole river
and failing miserably.
About the Creator
Harper Lewis
I'm a weirdo nerd who’s extremely subversive. I like rocks, incense, and all kinds of witchy stuff. Intrusive rhyme bothers me.
I’m known as Dena Brown to the revenuers and pollsters.
MA English literature, College of Charleston
Reader insights
Outstanding
Excellent work. Looking forward to reading more!
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Heartfelt and relatable
The story invoked strong personal emotions
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More stories from Harper Lewis and writers in Poets and other communities.
Letter to my Daughter
You have a choice to make here: are you going to continue the cycle, or are you going to break it? Keeping your son away from me hurts him; there’s no question about that. I thought you were being hurt, and I was trying to protect you, not punish anyone when I kept your grandfather away from you. I have said that I was wrong and I am sorry, but there was never any malice involved.
By Harper LewisExclusive • 2 months ago
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Seconds ago, the sullen sun set on the two of us… my exuberant furry companion and me. A fresh breeze embraces us, delivering welcome relief from the day’s oppressive heat. His typical stumbling and staggering along — apace with a sloth — has turned into trip-trapping, high-stepping, almost skipping along.
By Angie the Archivist 📚🪶about 20 hours ago in Petlife
Comments (4)
This is very telling. I mean even as a piece of nature poetry it's brilliant but digging deeper it's quietly devastating.
Beautiful imagery, Harper❣
A vivid and evocative piece — the imagery of nature’s decay and resilience beautifully mirrors the tension between effort and inevitability.
Fantastic!