The size of West Virginia

Few know the Mountain State but all

recognize it, easiest puzzle-piece of the states,

its awkward panhandles and pendulous gut

lolling into East Virginia.

A vast aquifer "lake" lies trapped under southeastern 

Greenland, larger than the size of West Virginia.

It’s a convenient scale for journalists, 

standard candle like the Cepheid Variables 

or Type Ia Supernovae that allow 

for dead reckoning on distant stars.

As of July 15th, fires have blackened nearly 21,000 

square miles. (That's nearly the size of West Virginia.)  

Cold-shouldered by its neighbors,

this place makes itself so handy – 

a homely measuring stick 

for the strange, hidden, elsewhere, lost.

Each year, the NOAA ship Okeanos Explorer

maps an area of the seafloor the size of West Virginia. 

Is this size of West Virginia calculated

by the erratic path around its borders, a man 

pushing a squealing wheel along the banks 

of the beautiful Ohio, dark-hearted Buffalo?

Costa Rica has 51,100 square kilometers of land, 

which is slightly less than the size of West Virginia.

Only the Mason-Dixon Line draws string-

straight across rough terrain, imagining it flat,

speaking the same language as draglines 

that tear the tops off mountains.

The net forest loss rose to 6.5 million hectares per year 

the equivalent to clear cutting an area the size of West Virginia.

Maybe a razor could slice it fine, trace

the topography of each ridge, carve a green

ribbon of West Virginia like Dido’s ox hide

expansive enough to bound the nation.

The 26 counties of the Irish republic 

a little more than the size of West Virginia.

Measurement tells us where we’ve been, where 

we are headed. Allegheny peaks shift red at dawn;

blue, blue shadows sift into depeopled towns.

Hear the long Doppler moan of a coal train always leaving. 

-Valerie Nieman

(Originally published in Cold Mountain Review)