Dry Well and a Broken Heart

A Dry well and a Broken heart

It seems I’ve got my heart broke,

By a man I’ve never met

Who owns a home of a hundred rooms,

About as rich as he can get 

A single prick upon the land,

To get a sample core

Another hole for the mines

Like thousands drilled before 

I do not know the science

The rhyme or reason why

But since they drilled that hole, 

My artesian well’s been dry

I thought it would flow forever, 

For me to hear and see

To wet my tongue with water,

And my heart with memories

Oh my father was a builder,

‘‘Twas him that shaped these hands

Who and heated up and molded

This boy into a man

A dreamer of contraptions 

Far outside my league 

Oh I never could’ve  finished,

Without him guiding me

With my sweat and his knowledge , 

Ya know we built it right

Two months we worked together 

From sunup  till the night

I’ve dreamt of future children,

Splashing in the summer heat

As I tell them of their grandpa, 

Who they didn’t get to meet

Now I cannot stand the sight of it,

So I let the tall weeds grow

For when I gaze upon it, 

It’s but my eyes that flow

It’s  only now I’ve learned the cost

Of profits to a man 

As we grasp at the dollars

That escape us like water in the sand 

The mines made daddy’s living,

Fed me half my life

I sit here and lament, 

Yet unsure I have the right

But like the son who asked to go

To where paradise lay

His dad could but reply 

Mr. Peabody’s coal train, done hauled it away

Will this world be broken,

By the men we’ve never met

Who take so much while giving little

Until there’s nothing left

A solemn thought to contemplate

As sad as my well is to see

Will empty holes, dry wells and landfills 

Be our human legacy

Nolan Kirkwood