Gold

The skin of the Earth is peeled away,
Exposing the bare bones within.
Her life-blood seeps from underground veins,
And her flesh lies in discarded heaps.
The damage is done in search of undiscovered riches,
But the labor drains away everything that makes the miner human.
What if, after all that agony,
There is no gold?

You can look all you want.
You can expect the very most of me.
You can dig and dig and dig
And drain away all that I am worth;
You won’t find anything.
I am me;

I am the Earth,
And our greatest values lie in exactly what you see.
If you cannot stop to admire our waterfalls, our birdsong, our sweeping plains, and majestic mountains,
Maybe it is you who are not worth the fight, the work,
The Pain.