Stone Walls

Stone walls run through these forests
Like the lines in a face.
Each rock means a back was bent
To fit it into place.
And a man stood here
With fields to clear –
A team of oxen and an axe was all he owned,
Now his fields are overgrown.

Lean men drove off the Indians
And carved up the land,
And raised rocks and junipers
Where full grown trees now stand.
The tide reached its crest,
Kept on moving west,
Leaving behind it all these monuments in stone,
And their fields are overgrown.

Evergreens, evergreens,
Straining towards the sun,
Oh, evergreens
It almost seems
None of it was done.