Kelly R. Samuels

Fraught and Most Likely Fruitless

 A Father a Daughter and a Search for Answers in a Toxic Town — The Washington Post

What was once used to grease our bike chains

                        likely kills. So, too: the creek and what flows

from the tap we now shun.

Bury the barrels

                                    and this woman, here.

Place an earthen cap. Sing hymns

in melancholy tones.

What numbers there are cannot be

                                                        tied to beyond probable

             and unnamed.

I’d set the green bean seeds gently

in the narrow trough he had made

                                   and water with river water, not knowing.

Thirty-seven miles south, down one of those long ribbony roads,

           there’s unsullied land, and the delicate blossom of apple.