Maya Lin: Ghost Forest

Poem by Joan Penn + Interview

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Haunting cries heard on East 23rd Street:

"Please, please, please, put down your cell phones,
turn your eyes skyward, look up and see us,
hear us and feel us, pause to bear witness
to our dwindling existence, sense absence
of sensory pleasures.

"No sunlight glistening on prickly green needles,
no pine-perfumed air, no birdsong,
only our barren branches, our withering bark,
our decaying trunks, our rotting roots,
our deteriorating interiors.