By Christine Chandler Prater
Honorable Mention, Poetry, Create | Encounter 2022
Boot bottoms, dusty with holy ground, trampled
Divine abundance desiccated by gulping
greed and inebriated industry
Land watered by war and plowed by gore
Opulence obtained through oppression
Suffering sown as seed
Flags planted instead of freedom
The stolen ground grumbles and beneath it
the blood of stolen bodies groans
Loam—once fertile and fruitful—
now crumbles, as parched and poisoned
as the American church witness
Stewardship forsaken for profit
Creation exploited, embezzled
The plunder hailed as God’s bounty
Cultivating dispossession, a mockery
of freedom. We pledge blind allegiance
to truth untold, praise a hidden history
Shoulders proud, hands over hearts
of stone, erecting monuments
where we should be kneeling graveside
Artist Statement:
This poem is a reflection on the poor stewardship and exploitation of creation and humanity for the sake of greed and industry in America.