Silted
Water flows through the gate,
molecular sheep fleeing the unknown,
A crystalline stream moving on
To sustain life elsewhere,
Leaving behind mud and sand and shit
Washed from a thousand fields.
Each storm, another dose of fertilizer
From a poisonous attempt to feed the world,
Another bath of oil and tar and antifreeze
Rinsed from six hundred miles of pavement,
Layers of soil stripped from the land
By a thousand tiny poor decisions.
The dam was built in ‘81, the lake shining, pure.
Like college students relying on their wealthy parents,
People looked to it for help in tough times.
And it did help, giving freely of itself,
Serving its purpose,
Unconcerned of how it might change.
But the lake did change.
Upstream rains flowed chocolate.
Freshwater seaweed grew and died and decayed.
Forty years of sediment, layer upon layer
Creating a twenty foot stratum.
A history of dirt and death and decay
Of the surrounding hills.
Of the unintended monstrosity of life.
There is no lake now.
At least, what’s there can't be called a lake anymore.
Filled to capacity with detritus,
It is no longer valued the way it once was.
Sometimes the only way to fix it is to blow the dam and start over.
But we are afraid of explosions.
Cover photo by Bernadetta Watts
