The City Poem by RIC BASTASA

the city was once
a forest of trees
when the pioneers
arrive with their axes
and each tree fell
and the river swollen
mothers had to have
more children
and fathers had to
plow more fields
and plant the rows and
rows of corn
as monkeys on top
of the remaining trees
tease
the grasshoppers
find enough sleep
and the ants keep
on building their
empire on mounds
and mounds of
dry land

that was how
a city was formed
my father said