Slow Magic - edit2

[dukealien]

edit2;

Slow Magic


Monsoons return:
stream cuts stone,
sand chokes river mouth.
Dams silt up;
     fail, undercut.
Charred forest sprouts,
cicadas rise each seven years.

True magic's slow,
not sleight of hand– 
its mystery
    deep history.

---

Thanks to all the critics.  The ending was, if not forced, at least facile.  I hope the change simplifies as well as clarifying the structure with a bit more typography.

As to choppiness,

those lines are choppy, yes.  I plead Pope's dictum that, when the matter is struggle, the reading should heave a bit (for example); here, there's a sort of stoppage with the choked river as well as for the dam failing and sprouts from beneath heavy char.

Other candidates for where "deep" now sits were "fated" and "concealed in."