By Charles M. Sumid     Copyright 2025     Written 1998

Old logging roads cut for harvest.

They follow where water won’t gather.
The makers read contours,
found routes earth favored.

Now deer use them.

Compacted earth refuses seeds.
Sixty years later paths stay clear.

Morning tracks.
Coyote, turkey, bear
on roads built for removing trees.

At intersections signs have fallen.
Animals know the crossroads.

Where logs waited stacked,
clearings persist.
Grass grows different.

Ditches dug for drainage
guide runoff still.

These roads show which sections fell,
how timber moved.

Hunters use them.

Hikers need them.
Search parties follow their lines.

Foresters too take these cuts,
paths their grandfathers’ bosses paid for.

In November when leaves fall
you see the whole network.

At dawn mist follows these old roads.