The Deceptive Grin of the Gravel Porters

Through the rain forests, up a long river,
over greensand and clay and red earth,
they toil like ants in their long procession,
hacking at difficulties that grow and close again,
covering once more the path behind them.

Following these unimportant carriers of the unimportant,
we seldom see them. When we do, they grin.
After the bad patches they turn with a kind of smirk
and beckon us. There are large animals too
that rustle throttle hemispheres.

Traveling over chalk to a familiar sea
is all we dream of where the trees are strangled
by the great sneering creepers. Sunlit birds
yakkety yak above our own deep gloom,
hundreds of feet above our inadequate heads.

How did they do it? We see the marks on trees
but made by what? teeth, weapons, little axes.
They don’t communicate except to grin.
We know they’re there but jungles grow so fast
and all we have are bruised and bleeding hands.

Gavin Ewart