Cutting Too Close To The Quick (Poetry)

What are they going to do
when there is nothing left to cut? —
once the sweet suffering earth
has given up the struggle to replenish
the wounded trees forgotten how to bud
their sap no longer any will to rise
the only urge left to allow the rot
to conquer kinder than the callous blade

They do not count the little deaths they cause —
the tiny lives that sleep within the wood
their winter hibernation paid no heed
for those that slaughter cannot fathom need
to let the season have its chilly lie
and not disturb its dark and silent plot
the wrecks of sticks and bodies are no more
than tidy profit robbing Nature blind