Depression*

Suddenly the touch of grass beneath bare feet

is cold and flat

The trees that were stately gentlemen

guarding life and honor and all things holy

become impediments to walk around

The growing season,

a spring rife with anticipation and new hope

is filled with cracks and tears

that a kinder winter had covered.

The mines are dead

the ore of human resource

has run dry.

No tears to cry

no mocking celebration

of a living death

no graves in which to hide the living

no life in which to wish for graves.

"I gets weary and sick of trying"

No glory  in the rolling mountains

no surge of blood flowing through the temples

at the mention of the sea.

Instead, a great plain of hard baked clay,

too barren to be a challenge,

too empty to be a prayer.