No Happy New Year Poem by Andy Brookes

at the peripheries of nature that seem neither natural nor man made
that rangy area between town and urban sprawl
the builders spoil heaps full of broken brick and hardcore
where the grass slips from manicuredgreen trim
to ragged and tufted like uncombed hair.
those little nature reserves for bees and butterflies.

soon the nibbles of man have become great greedy mouth fulls
eating up what some consider waste land to be made profitable,
by those who know the price of everything but the value of nothing
yet for othersthese are small bastions for wild life, worth more than gold.

They will be covered too soon by Tarmacked roads and hard stoned pavement.
they lose their protection to become yet more endangered species
look on the works of man a weep.
destruction is easy but the dollar speaks louder than the weak voices of decent.

Yes look on man's destruction and weep