Nature’s Monuments

“The fire came through in ‘sixty four,” the wizened farmer said.

“At first it headed for the house, but turned this way instead.

The plain back then was thick with trees,

Their drought-dry leaves caught fire with ease

And all too soon each tree became 

Fresh fuel for a fearsome flame!”

He paused as memory’s embers glowed and then he spoke again.

“That lifeless pair seen over there are all that now remain.

Since, at the time, more fires were feared,

The land round here was promptly cleared,

But those two trees remind us all

That here once stood a forest tall.”