Scott Owens reads his poem in front of Mitzi Gellman’s Henry River Mill Village, 2012. Photo courtesy of Roger and Ginny Sanford.

Scott Owens
Point of View From 20’
after “Henry River Mill Village, 2012” by Mitzi Gellman

From here, one of the houses
I grew up in, close to the ground,
floor boards rotting through,
paint pixelating,
everything giving in.

To the left, factory or farm,
satisfaction of labor,
illusion of enough.
To the right,
the darkness within.

Above, the only choices
they offered. And everywhere,
the bullet and bomb,
threat of destruction,
resistance through uniformity.

Only there, something
that lasts. A tree like the ones
I climbed in. And beyond that,
a mountain. And beyond that,
the sky.