After the 2006 Buffalo October Storm, orange ribbons marked trees deemed too weak to save, often long entire sections of streets. For more on the storm, see http://kwregan.blogspot.com

   A yellow ribbon some tie round
   To say their hearts to loves are bound;
   To hold this prayer for safe return
   We ask a standard of the ground.

   But orange ribbons, row on row,
   Bespeak a heartbreak all can know:
   No leaves to home return may come,
   And in the spring bare plots will show.

   Could we have mounted limbs and shaken?
   That were a chance could not be taken.
   So weight that not a cross could bear
   Cleft company, in cold forsaken.

   What promises to keep have we?
   Replant the world we long to see,
   And nurture green our forebears gave,
   For more than God can love a tree.