Kathy Lauren Miller

WE were wild as Indians, then

traipsing ancient paths

into the shadowed green

where hollowed out logs

became resplendent canoes

ferrying us down the stream

where tunnels of fallen boughs

arched like bridges above

oh, how we did dream, then

of bows and arrows and painted men

There was magic in those days

I need only to close my eyes

To go back, again.

They were wrong. All of them. The deniers and the politicians, all were wrong. The scientists, denigrated for their audacity to speak truth to power, were far too late with their warnings.

Our demise had long been written in our carbon footprints.

Viewed from space, the earth is a living, breathing entity suspended in an endless sea of night, inhaling and exhaling with a blue and green set of lungs.

Is the earth sentient? Perhaps. It has defended itself from debris flung from the cosmos. When volcanoes spewed molten lava creating dense clouds that blocked the sun, it held its breath while all other living things perished. And we humans? We are the most malignant of cancers. The earth defends itself from us and rightly so.

Malice or retribution is not the earth’s intention. The earth is not evil or benign. It just is. It survives. Will we?

What mysteries await

in hidden places

the past revealed

in their traces

of what had been

but is no more

yet, we are drawn, inexorably

to explore

To dwell here in the bright

of verdant green and sunlight

of sweet scents that delight

I would lay me down

listening to the sound

of nature, all around

she sings to my soul

her music, lyrics of old

a treasure, far better than gold