The Lost Trees The double shame in man's war against man is the residual effect on nature; an innocent , helpless bystander. The sense of potential devastation is the prevailing tone throughout the poem, "Gathered by the River," by Denise Levertov. The spoliation caused by nuclear war is not limited to the loss of human lives. Nature can take a comparable amount of time to recover from a nuclear holocaust. The impact of war victims to humankind is negligible as compared to years of recovery required to reinstate the slow-growing trees. When Levertov notes, "the trees are not indifferent" (l 13), she is saying that nature has a huge stake in th