The Backfill

There is a point where the excavation fails.

Where the ground is too hard

and the artifacts become elusive.

Where we spend too long

sifting through the backdirt,

searching for a diagnostic sherd we missed

some patterned rim or check-stamped proof

that there was once a heart

beating beneath the clay.

I sat at the edge of the pit,

waiting for a sign,

a scrap of data to prove

I wasn't just digging my own grave

in the name of a history

already forgotten