In A Mississauga Woodland
A poem by Mississauga’s Poet Laureate, Paul Edward Costa.

It’s a gradual, organic invasion
taking back altered scenes no one photographed
emerging over broken, bladed machines.

You should leave
and return when this place
occurs to you by chance

if you want
to not only see progress
but also recognize
evidence of its reality.

A web of branches
straining to hold back
crushing, atmospheric noise
carried on sharp winds snaking
in like babbling, gentle waves.

Some stumbling upon the river
find it magnificent,
even mighty,
in the absence of knowing
how the trails and eroded shores where they wander
sat beneath currents flowing
high overhead,
their eco-sphere inverted
where what once ruled
still hibernates on the other side.