Barren Mountains

I grew up in Southeast Alaska, and bore witness to many ecologies disappearing: the Mendenhall Glacier, salmon and halibut, now herring. I was in middle school taking the ferry to a nearby town for a swim meet. The heavy boat was weaving in and out of the islands of the Inside Passage when we came around the corner of one island. All the trees on the entire mountain range in viewing distance had recently been cut down. Wave upon wave of mountainside where spruce and cedar once touched the top of the sky and descended straight into the ocean had been erased. The ferry cruised alongside that mountain range for miles. And I remember the absence of those trees.