There is a forest I do not like

You may not like it either

A forest far larger than any other.

 

No trick of words or meaning is employed here

It’s a real forest made of real trees

It has more trees than any other single forest.

 

A forest that stretches beyond every horizon

Vast is its cloak, prolific in the extreme

A forest unplanned, uncultivated, growing unchecked.

 

Its trees steal the light from millions of homes

A leafy screen across every cherished belvedere

Yet no one seems to lift a hand or care a jot.

 

A forest of little beauty, just a scrubby dark tangle

A barrier to all mankind, a fence to all free spirits

Of thorns, barbed branches and razor coarse bark.

 

A forest so large you cannot escape it

A forest that harbours all kinds of life and secret ills

Spreadings insidiously ignoring all boundaries.

 

You may think it only a wood, the bit you see

Yet its sylvan mantle never ends, reaching everywhere

Wearying a million miles for passer byes.

 

No majestic forest this with noble trees

Just scrub and brush and wilded birch

A forest un-named, unloved, untamed.

 

A dingy grey green hedge that creeps beside

Every river, road and railway in the land

Creating a uniform dull monotonous corridor.

 

For the jaded traveller to gaze upon.