old casuarinas

old casuarinas casting a hard shade
on the crushed limestone of a noontime road
hat signals could the play of light encode
of generations that had worked and played
the promises both kept and long betrayed
each passing donkey silent under load
could not explain and would not forebode
the longer journey or the bright cascade
none hide from voices latent in the air
the messages of knowledge never cheap
but paid with effort and crushed out of stone
what's left behind is nothing but hard care
and all those things we could not bear to keep
but still the tree lies weeping in the bone