Anonymity’s Reward

Walking through a surreal forest of abundance
not yet pruned of its integrity
one ponders the sunlight
as it continues its respectful hide-and-seek play with shade

For encroachment plods ever closer
leaving behind that which once grew from roots long nourished
by nature's faithful light and dark presence
only to now fulfill but man's harvest of covetous want

Few know such anonymity
for seedlings from laboratories of progress
fly aimlessly from life's innocent Petri dish
and become the polluted breath of greed

What price this convoluted harvest of Want
once rendered by life's moisture
once absorbed for mind's growth
but now worshiped as mist for the insatiable fog of deception?

Will our children always strain to see this vapid forest for the trees
as its rapidly disappearing shade
makes inhospitable and barren
the now seared once organic-rich carpet of opportunity?

And what of our mental landfills
for discarded prospects
once of passion
once of thought
once of envelopes' pushed?

Will our youth too be sown under
by the earthmover's blade
only to reach up into dusty residue
for that which we denied them?

Beware the darkness outside night's magic
for it knows not of sunrise or sunset
only the shroud of conceit
that blackens one's ether into dark clouds
to suffocate the light of anonymity’s reward
unflinching integrity