Heritage

This is Canada, after all.
In the nation's capital where
among the crush of highways
commercial zones, office
towers and housing accommodate
a thriving city, its boundaries
also embrace forests and
wetlands, farms and rivers
passing through with green
parklands proudly sharing
space alongside hotels and
apartment buildings, stretching
to the near horizon, where
islands perched within waterways
whisper of indigenous mysteries
and legend speaking of logging
enterprises, the famed wilderness
exploits of the fearless and
hardy coureurs des bois, the
fur trade and Hudsons Bay
opening up the country's far
northern regions, from sea to sea
to sea, the northern boreal
forests to the western mountain
ranges, this land we love.