Earth Day 2024 | V E R S E and I M A G E

Posts Tagged ‘Earth Day 2024’

Earth Day Prelude – Four

Posted in ecology, Ecopoetry, tagged Bill Griffin, Christina Baumis, David Radavich, Earth Day 2024, Earth Day Every Day, ecology, Ecopoetry, Jane Hirshfield, Katherine Mansfield, nature photography, nature poetry, Patricia Hooper on April 21, 2024| 5 Comments »

April 21, 2024

For, lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone;

The flowers appear on the earth, the time of the singing of birds is come, and the voice of the turtledove is heard in our land;

The fig tree putteth forth her green figs, and the vines with the tender grape give a good smell.

Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away.

++++++ Song of Solomon 2:11-13

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I Open the Window

What I wanted

wasn’t to let in the wetness.

That can be mopped.

Nor the cold.

There are blankets.

What I wanted was

the siren, the thunder, the neighbor,

the fireworks, the dog’s bark.

Which of them didn’t matter?

Yes, this world is perfect,

all things as they are.

But I wanted

not to be

the one sleeping soundly, on a soft pillow,

clean sheets untroubled,

dreaming there still might be time,

while this everywhere crying

Jane Hirshfield

Shared by Debra Kaufman, Mebane, NC, who writes:

I love the subtlety in every poem by Jane Hirsfield. In her new, profound collection, The Asking, every poem is a kind of inquiry that allows readers to join her in generously observing the world and all its beings. She is never assuming, she investigates even the smallest of gestures or creatures, to stay open each day to possibilities, while still acknowledging the darkness.

++++++ Debra

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. . . the road is found in the persistent walking of it . . .

++++++ Jane Hirshfield

May your trails be crooked, winding, lonesome, dangerous, leading to the most amazing view. May your mountains rise into and above the clouds.

++++++ Edward Abbey

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Fall Changes

I left those three crows

the last corn in my garden,

and not one thanked me.

++++++ *

Bright August sunlight

but just north of the woodpile

a November wind.

++++++ *

September begins

with a vee of geese flying

and two fat, slow frogs.

++++++ *

All night fallen leaves

pile up under the maples—

old thoughts, cast away.

++++++ *

A ragged black glove

high in the oak’s bare branches

flies away, cawing.

++++++ *

Through the leafless hedge

a neighbor I’ve never met

waves from her window.

Patricia Hooper

Shared by David Radavich, Charlotte NC, who writes:

I greatly admire, Patricia Hooper; Fall Changes is from her book Wild Persistence. I love the quiet interactions in this poem between the human and the non-human natural worlds – so comfortable and easy, so assumed. The haiku portraits are subtly varied yet intimately linked, and the mere contemplation of trees and birds and frogs leads the witnesses to greet each other in friendly neighborliness even though they are strangers. This is a gentle masterpiece of evocative scene-painting.

The other poem is called New Emigrants from my book The Countries We Live In (Main Street Rag, 2012). This is a more incisive critique of climate change and human greed.

++++++ David

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New Emigrants

These maples have lived

here all their lives,

turned colors by the season,

offered shade, been

neighborly

on the edge of the city.

Who would have thought,

after all this time,

air could become

the enemy?

Earth has allied itself

with terrorists

who decry

the wickedness of weeds.

Water streams in

under cover of drought,

fire climbs

out with its fierce

fingers.

Now some are asking

whether it might be better

for the old limbs

to give place

to homes and people

and their saving chemicals.

Already I see wise ones

taking their leaves

north to where ice melts

into soft angels.

David Radavich, Charlotte, NC

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i thank You God for most this amazing

day: for the leaping greenly spirits of trees

and a blue true dream of sky; and for everything

which is natural which is infinite which is yes.

++++++ e.e.cummings

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Voices of the Air

But then there comes that moment rare

When, for no cause that I can find,

The little voices of the air

Sound above all the sea and wind.

The sea and wind do then obey

And sighing, sighing double notes

Of double basses, content to play

A droning chord for the little throats—

The little throats that sing and rise

Up into the light with lovely ease

And a kind of magical, sweet surprise

To hear and know themselves for these—

For these little voices: the bee, the fly,

The leaf that taps, the pod that breaks,

The breeze on the grass-tops bending by,

The shrill quick sound that the insect makes.

Katherine Mansfield

Shared by Tina Baumis, Goose Creek, SC, who writes:

Ms. Mansfield enlarged the smallest of movements and voices in a Georgia O’Keefe style, drawing us into the captivating moments she observed when drowning out the sea and wind. We too, can relate to the drone of the bigger sounds in our day to day lives and rediscover wonder, peace, and joy of nature when we allow ourselves time to immerse into nature’s voices. “The leaf that taps, the pod that breaks, The breeze on the grass-tops bending by,” are lines that speak to me.

I took a walk in the woods

and came out taller than the trees.++++++ Henry David Thoreau

This quotation elevates your spirits inspiring you to go outdoors to appreciate the magic we often overlook during our full days. Recharge. Serenity.

The California Urban Forest Council holds an annual haiku themed contest. I was fortunate to have my haiku listed on their Facebook pages. On February 17th, 2024, my haiku was posted. An attempt to evoke feelings as Mr. Thoreau’s quote.

++++++ Tina

positivity

gather under canopy

mood swings lift with breeze

Christina (Tina) Baumis

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We cannot be truly ourselves in any adequate manner without all our companion beings throughout the earth.

++++++ Thomas Berry

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Finally, the southwestern US is home to several species of scolecophidian blindsnakes in the genera Rena and Leptotyphlops. These are tiny and have undifferentiated body scales, meaning that all scale rows around the entire body (including the underside) are the same width. They are iridescent and extremely difficult to count, which has given rise to one of my all-time favorite quotes from a scientific paper: “We castigate the ancient lineage that begat Liotyphlops, for it is obviously the worst designed snake from which to obtain systematic data” (Dixon & Kofron 1983).

https://brill.com/view/journals/amre/4/2/article-p241_12.xml?language=en&body=contentSummary-44180

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To celebrate EARTH DAY 2024 we are featuring seven posts of poems submitted by readers – poems by William Blake to Walt Whitman, Robinson Jeffers to A.R.Ammons to Linda Pastan, and by a number of contemporary poets. Check in every day or two – connect to the earth and to each other!

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Earth Day Prelude – Three

Posted in ecology, Ecopoetry, tagged Bill Griffin, David Dixon, Earth Day 2024, Earth Day Every Day, ecology, Ecopoetry, Hannah Fries, Jenny Bates, nature, nature photography, nature poetry, William Blake on April 19, 2024| 5 Comments »

April 19, 2024

…the path to heaven

doesn’t lie down in flat miles.

It’s in the imagination

with which you perceive

this world

and the gestures

with which you honor it.

++++++ Mary Oliver

❦ ❦ ❦

Insects with Long Childhoods

June bug, stag beetle, cicada –

three, seven, thirteen years as larvae

feasting underground in the gentle

rot of roots and castoffs, gone generations,

only a few weeks in the light

sharp as the blades of consciousness, incessant

buzz, cosmic background of loss

threaded through late summer’s throbbing

days, lush nights, a brevity so full

it must feel like th eternity they came from.

I have a child who asks a question

of the air’s every hum. He has not learned grief.

Sky, he says, and shovels soil into his mouth,

let’s it drip out mud.

Hannah Fries

from ECOTHEO Review, 3/2024

Shared by Lynda Rush Myers, Durham NC, who writes:

The poet, Hannah Fries, reminds me of Pattiann Rogers: scientific, technical, yet capturing the dense brevity of her subjects’ lives. The turn of the poem came as a touching surprise. Every parent can relate. A child’s word and actions capture his reality. The mother enjoys the unforgettable moment, knowing her son will learn grief all too soon.

++++++ Lynda

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There is only one subject: what it feels like to be alive. Nothing is irrelevant. Nothing is typical.

++++++ Richard Rodriquez, in American Scholar, Spring 2002

Those who contemplate the beauty of the earth find reserves of strength that will endure as long as life lasts. There is something infinitely healing in the repeated refrains of nature – the assurance that dawn comes after night, and spring after winter.

++++++ Rachel Carson (1907-1964)

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The Fly

Little fly,

Thy summer’s play

My thoughtless hand

Has brush’d away.

Am not I

A fly like thee?

Or art not thou

A man like me?

For I dance,

And drink, & sing

Till some blind hand

Shall brush my wing.

If thought is life

And strength and breath,

And the want

Of thought is death,

Then am I

A happy fly,

If I live

Or if I die.

William Blake (1757 – 1827)

from Songs of Experience; in the public domain.

Shared by Paul Karnowski, Asheville NC, who writes:

I like the connection Blake makes between the narrator and the “trivial” fly. Humans too easily dismiss the rest of the natural world because we have the ability to “think.” But it’s the countless thoughtless acts of blind hands – from other humans – that bring about our demise. Life and death connects us all – from the greatest thinker to the lowliest fly.

++++++ Paul

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Am I leading the life that my soul, / Mortal or not, wants me to lead is a question / That seems at least as meaningful as the question / Am I leading the life I want to live.

++++++ Carl Dennis, A Chance for the Soul from Practical Gods

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If I Fell

Crow knows me.

Can see the difference

between me and another.

Gave me a feather

I keep

in case I need to fly.

I know Crow

from Blackbird

and Raven

yet wonder

what Crow

would want

to keep

from me.

Perhaps a token

of my essence

in case Crow needs

to dream of flying.

David Dixon

Poetry In Plain Sight 2024, NC Poetry Society

Shared by Jenny Bates, Germanton, NC, who writes:

Life is a process of waking up from a long and ancient sleep of the soul. David Dixon embodies this whether he means to or not in his poetry. This poem I chose to send, If I Fell, has also been chosen for 2024 Poetry in Plain Sight through the NC Poetry Society.

As far as my own poem, it is a plea, a prayer that each of us has to fill up the emptiness inside us in different ways…even the Earth. My poem, Conceived and Born is from my Pushcart nominated book, ESSENTIAL.

++++++ Jenny

❦

Conceived and Born

There’s no suckling here

as though we were

going to get some anyway

The sanctity of Earth is a fast.

The holy presence of prayer a fast.

We are born of a mother that is not

dependent on us.

She is a planet — and a small, fragile

one at that.

Jenny Bates, Germanton NC

❦ ❦ ❦

And this our life, exempt from public haunt, finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, sermons in stones, and good in everything. I would not change it.

++++++ William Shakespeare, As You Like It

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Earth Day Prelude – Two

Posted in ecology, Ecopoetry, Imagery, tagged Earth Day 2024, ecopo, Grace Paley, Joan Barasovska, Joyce Kilmer, Susan Laughter Meyers on April 17, 2024| 8 Comments »

April 17, 2024

While calling ourselves intelligent, we’ve lost touch with the natural world. As a result, we’ve lost touch with our own souls. I believe we can’t access our full intelligence and wisdom without some real connection to nature.

I think of soul as anything’s ultimate meaning which is held within. Soul is the blueprint inside of every created thing telling it what it is and what it can become. When we meet anything at that level, we will respect, protect, and love it.

++++++ Richard Rohr

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This Hill

this hill

crossed with broken pines and maples

lumpy with the burial mounds

of uprooted hemlocks (hurricane

of ‘thirty-eight) ++ out of their rotting hearts

generations rise trying once more

to become the forest

just beyond them

tall enough to be called trees

in their youth like aspen++ a bouquet

of young beech is gathered

they still wear last summer’s leaves

the lightest brown almost translucent

how their stubbornness decorates

the winter woods

on this narrow path

ice holds the black undecaying

oak leaves in its crackling grip

oh ++ it’s become too hard to walk

++ ++ ++ a sunny patch ++ I’m suddenly

in water to my ankles ++ April

Grace Paley (1922-2007)

Shared by Joan Barasovska, Chapel Hill NC, who writes:

I’m precisely connected to this poem in several ways. Grace Paley grew up in New York City — I grew up in nearby Philadelphia — but writes occasionally about her connection to the natural world, as I do. I live in a wooded area, and although the trees surrounding me aren’t birches or aspens, in mid-March they are bare and some “still wear last summer’s leaves.” When Paley wrote “This Hill” she was an older woman, and walking in the woods was becoming difficult, though the desire was there, all true for me.

++++++ Joan

❦

The Day I Walked on Fire

it wasn’t fire

it was ginkgo leaves

the sun lit them yellow

they were juicy with heat

the day I walked on ginkgo leaves

I imagined they were fire

that my shoes were melting

that my feet were burning

and I felt no pain

on that autumn day

when I burned to be

a holy woman

Joan Barasovska

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When power leads man toward arrogance, poetry reminds him of his limitations. When power narrows the areas of man’s concern, poetry reminds him of the richness and diversity of his existence. When power corrupts, poetry cleanses.

++++++ John Fitzgerald Kennedy

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Trees

I think that I shall never see

A poem lovely as a tree.

A tree whose hungry mouth is prest

Against the earth’s sweet flowing breast;

A tree that looks at God all day,

And lifts her leafy arms to pray;

A tree that may in summer wear

A nest of robins in her hair;

Upon whose bosom snow has lain;

Who intimately lives with rain.

Poems are made by fools like me,

But only God can make a tree.

Joyce Kilmer (1886 – 1918)

https://poets.org/poem/trees; this poem is in the public domain

Shared by Dee Neil, Elkin NC, who writes:

We recited this poem every day in Mrs. Black’s first grade class and I have always loved it. I was supposed to go camping there [Joyce Kilmer Memorial Forest in western North Carolina] with my son’s family last summer, but I fell and broke my arm the week before we were scheduled to go. Still on my bucket list for this year. This is on the back of a hiking journal my daughter-in-law made for me for the trip.

++++++ Dee

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Paying attention is a form of reciprocity with the living world, receiving the gifts with open eyes and open heart.

++++++ Robin Wall Kimmerer

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Banding Hummingbirds

+++ San Pedro River, Arizona

+++ +++ I, who know nothing of ornithology,

wear sticker number nineteen. This release,

the last of the day, is mine. Under the awning

the ornithologist at the table puts a straw to her lips

and blows, parting the feathers to check for mites.

There are mites.

+++ +++ She cradles the bird in one hand,

sexes it, names the species (Anna’s), and figures

the approximate age. Places it in a miniature sling

and weighs it, wraps the metal band around one leg.

I walk over to the designated grassy area,

both hands in my pockets.

+++ +++ +++ The day is raw.

When it’s time, I hold out a palm, now warm.

The assistant fits the tubes of a stethoscope

to my ears, pressing the disc against my bird.

I hear a low whir, a tiny motor running in my hand.

Up to twelve hundred beats a minute, she says.

+++ I, who know so little,

barely take a breath. My bird’s head is a knob

of red iridescence on the fleshy pad of my hand.

I am nothing but a convenient warming bench,

yet for now I am that bench. Warm.

His breast is thin-bone hollow, she says,

+++ +++ where he should be round.

His eyes dark and still, his feet tucked

behind his body. He lies there, that tiny motor.

I don’t think of years ago, my mother, my father-

those I loved who, having lain down, never rose up.

For once, I know the worth,

++++++ at least to me. What I don’t know

is whether this bird in hand will rouse

the way he did earlier, pinched between thumb

and index finger and tipped toward a feeder,

when he drank with conspicuous hunger.

You could see the tongue.

Susan Laughter Meyers

from My Dear, Dear Stagger Grass, Winner of the 2012 Cider Press Review Editor’s Prize

Shared by Richard Allen Taylor, Myrtle Beach SC, who writes:

I was wracking my brain and finally it occurred to me to look on my bookshelf for Susan Laughter Meyers’s My Dear, Dear Stagger Grass. There are actually several poems in the book that might be candidates for Earth Day, but I was especially attracted to this one for several reasons. It reminds me that sometimes you can tell the story through the images (even if literal) rather than trying to “explain.” (I need to be reminded of that every day, it seems.) The poem has a little mystery. (Why are they banding the hummingbirds? Do the mites present a danger to their health? Are the bones in the chest supposed to be hollow or has the bird been sick? I’ll have to look this stuff up or else I won’t sleep tonight.)

++++++ Richard

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. . . when man and nature

got married they agreed never to divorce although

they knew they could never be happy & would have only

the one child Art who would bring mostly grief

to them both . . .

++++++ Firewood, Midquest, Fred Chappell