Planet Earth Poem: The Legend of Paper Plates by John Haines

About the poem The Legend of Paper Plates by John Haines about the planet Earth.

The Legend of Paper Plates

They trace their ancestry

back to the forest.

There all the family stood,

proud, bushy and strong.

Until hard times,

when from fire and drought

the patriarchs crashed.

The land was taken for taxes,

the young people cut down

and sold to the mills.

Their manhood and womanhood

was crushed, bleached

with bitter acids,

their fibres dispersed

as sawdust

among ten million offspring.

You see them at any picnic,

at ball games, at home,

and at state occasions.

They are thin and pliable.

porous and identical.

They are made to be thrown away.

JOHN HAINES