My Heart Sank Poem by Deanna Samuels

My heart sank -
Still sad that a whole mature wood was cut
down along Elgin Mills Road last week,
returning northward on Bathurst Street today,
a little passed Highway 7, barriers, roadworks.
Notices indicate Road Improvements.
But at what cost? My heart sank again.
Mature, beautiful lush green fir trees cut down,
lay on top of the other, pile upon pile,
heaped up at the side on the road bank.
Not only firs, but other species of trees,
many mature and yet, some quite young
and only in recent years planted.
This scene of carnage continued till
reaching Major MacKenzie Drive,
observed as well, natural small verges
where wild life had made their habitats
and numerous wild plant life grew -
extinguished, gone.
All for the sake of ever-growing traffic needs.

This type of natural destruction goes on,
unabated all over the city.
Is it that planners and councils don't
understand that trees help to oxygenate air -
air that humans and all animal life must
breathe to stay alive while nature filters the
carbon dioxide we breathe out as well as
the contamination of traffic fumes and
chimneys oozing out noxious gases.
This newly cleared stretch will soon be
prepared and widened - more traffic,
more carbon dioxide, but now will have
little to aid and refresh the air
as treeless, lifeless - only concrete.
My heart sank once more at the very thought.


Written at Richmond Hill - 22nd April 2026