Over the cities and villages hovering
coal smoke drew curtains, gauze-veils of darkness
even in daylight, blackening windowsills,
ledges and cornices, drifting in tiny bituminous
particles into the lungs. Still the remembered
scent of those hearthfires haunts me,
rich with nostalgia. Resinous fragrance of forests
unthinkably ancient, incense shrunk to a black rock
buried and hidden deep, deep for eons:
dug out with heart-killing labor, laid on a hearthstone,
lighted. Myrrh on an ignorant altar. Arson of centuries.
Forest after forest unclosed all its complex, sweet darkness,
curled up into the wind, and was gone where the wind went.