lutruwita/Tasmania is disappearing before our eyes.
But most can’t see it.

Beyond the locked gates
where the ancient deep green forests grow the only ones seeing what is left
are the men who arrive in dozers
to demolish the tall eucalyptus
and everything beneath them.

The people are quiet
as they go about their daily chores
and turn their heads
while the carcasses of the ancient trees
are dragged down the highways
on the backs of the chariots of destruction disappearing out of view
destined to our human waste bins as tissues sewage plants as toilet paper
rubbish tips as old pieces of furniture replaced by new.

Let us take a moment to see what is disappearing.



THE FORESTS

where the tallest flowering plants on Earth
loom over the rainforest understorey
flowering in pure crisp white
its pollinating moths painting only the colour white.

Where butterflies, dragonflies, myrtle moth, cicadas and bees are just a fraction of the insect community
that is a surging force for change.

From the cacophony of the birds in the sunlight to the stealth of the night owl
to Mother Devil with four pups in her den
to the spirited quoll darting through the ferns
in this stronghold of life.

What we don’t see
we ignore
as this stronghold of their ages is demolished
removed after all time.
For all time.


THE FORESTS

drenched by Roaring Forties rain
and pristine waters that
many millions of impoverished planet Earth’s people
can only imagine.


THE FORESTS

that are not ours to plunder.
not ours to squander
in the cause of here-today-gone-tomorrow profit.
Rendered ancient in all our imagining
but disappearing now
stripped bare to
barren hot denuded lands.

If not for these sleeping brave defenders
who will stand between the forest and the dozer?
Who will climb the heights of the tower
the natural tower
holding tight to the swaying giant
to sleep through tumultuous night?

Unlike the forests
the defenders are not disappearing.
They are growing in number and defiance.
These are the ones that see
behind the locked gates
and witness the plunder.

Determined to defend the life-filled
wild forests
of mystical lutruwita/Tasmania.

Few see the spirited defenders ascend the giants at night
and none share their aerie high above
the sleeping fellow defenders
surrounded by dozers
awaiting the dangerous morning.
And the loggers.
I write this as we wait.
A full moon is rising over this plateau graveyard
of the slaughtered ancients.
The summer night air is at 3 degrees.

This carnage will end.

By Jenny Weber