Poems by Neva Bryan

Old Logging Road

by Neva Bryan

Neva lives in the watersheds of the Clinch River and the Powell River in the mountain coalfields of southwestern Virginia.

An old logging road sidles
around the mountain
behind our desolate house.
My desolate house.

I trudge through mud to the top
and eye the rapescape
of amputated limbs,
knotty torsos,
exposed hearts
ringed
to count the years.

Here deep gashes scar
abandoned land.
Poison ivy, kudzu -- wild vines --
fill empty spaces.

I stumble and reach out,
clutch a blackberry switch
to steady myself.
Thorns pierce my palm,
draw red beads to the surface.

I rub blood across my barren belly,
weep for this wasteland.

Originally published in Bluestone Review