Prosperity to Waste A Sestina of a Lumber Baron

There they stood--tall, green and wild
No one yet thinking how to be prospering
White pine --even oak and ash--standing ready to waste
Sven and Johan and Stanley were now to cross paths
A hoard, a mass descended into this place and time
Tapping, chopping, creaking, crashing became so natural

Settlers rushed in and changed what was natural
And camps with flapjacks and whiskey--wooly and wild
The long winters and log jammed rivers waited their time
Some men-a few-were financed, were borrowing, were prospering
Horses pulled, tugged and dragged their logs down paths
At river’s mouth each sawmill knew no waste

Entrepreneurs, millionaires, money to make, no time to waste
While never-ending logs seemed now so natural
The mill owners following their destiny, their paths
A forest, cut and sawn, has lost its wild
Towns are built from this pine, growing and prospering
Could there ever be a better time?

Schemes, dreams, maybe greed came in time
Take it all, leave nothing, do not waste
What’s a tree for but to keep us prospering?
Build the barns, the mansions, the stables, it’s natural
We’ve done this with our own hands, out of the wild
Little Hansey, Luke and Ole dream too of those paths

Who among us would not want such a path?

But those schemes, dreams and wondrous plans run out in time
Bankruptcies, ruin, finances gone wild
The mansions, lost riches, the debt, the waste
Recovery, even again deserted, and shame so natural
Though Peder, Karl, and Jerome remain, these steadily, slowly prospering

A city, though he helped in prospering
Yet he who made it then squandered his paths
Amiable, eager, achievement so natural
A man once revered, now gone in time
A barn once held the horses; now laid to waste
Once a mansion in town; soon a field of cockle burrs so wild




And prospering, in time
All will  waste away  into paths of history
What began as wild  thus returns to natural
Oh Time, even while prospering, you waste no paths, wild and natural

Carol Voigts 2008