Advice from Rock Creek Park

What will survive us

has already begun

Oak galls

Two termites’ curious

self-perpetuating bodies

Letting the light through the gaps

They lay out their allegiances

under the roots

of an overturned tree

Almost always better

to build than to wreck

You can build in a wreck

Under the roots

of an overturned tree

Consider the martin that hefts

herself over traffic cones

Consider her shadow

misaligned

over parking-lot cement

Saran Wrap scrap in her beak

Nothing lasts

forever not even

the future we want

The president has never

owned the rain