At the request of a #PawpawFanatic on Facebook, I followed up with a limerick:
If you park your car
in the wrong place, it can wreck
a perfect sunset.
Ahhh! NOW I hear rain!
It’s crossing the field, through woods,
soon will splash my legs.
The green of Spring got
poisoned. Now it looks brown, dead
like everything else.
How many songbirds/
get sacrificed so we have
no vermin? Balance!
OR
How many songbirds/
must die so we have no mice?
Feral cat balance.
What if the trees deep/
in the woods miss us as much/
as we’re missing them?
Back Story:
The other day I was walking through the woods at Spirit Tree Farms, and I felt like I should spend some time at the base of The Old Woman of the Woods, “our” pre-Civil War giant oak tree. As I was feeling her bark, connecting with her, I felt a deep melancholy, a sense of longing, a sense of missing her. I wondered why I’d stayed away from connecting with her, and Nature, and God’s creations, for so long.
Suddenly, I was away that the feeling was mutual. It was almost as if she whispered “Hello, Boy. Welcome back. I’ve missed you. I’ve been lonely for you.”
I’d never thought of that concept before, that maybe the trees miss us! That thought inspired this haiku.
Why am I here? Why
am I – we set on this land?
I know, yet don’t do.
Friends were complaining after a major ice storm in the Chattanooga Metro area (Catoosa County, NW Georgia). With lows around 6 degrees above zero, it WAS cold! As the sun came up, it showed something magical: Diamonds in the Trees. I walked through the woods and out into the wildflower field at Spirit Tree Farms, where goldenrods, pokeweed, late bonneset, blackberries, grasses, and other native plants joined with honey locusts, hickory and oak trees, and more, to show off a collection of sparkling jewels unmatched at any jewelry store. I riffed these iambic lines in a video, trying to stiffle my crying. Thanks to HomeGrownNationalPark.org for the inspiration, and to Heavenly Father and His Son Jesus for the Creation.
I’m called tree hugger,
greener,
environmentalist,
eco-warrior.
I call myself
those names, too.
But when I see
red-faced screamers
demanding that
governments and nations
make accords,
do something,
force compliance,
I back away.
Giving government
more power
is not where I’ll waste
my waste-fighting
eco-warrior
energies.
Haven’t we learned
from Muir,
Thoreau,
Leopold,
and others?
They DID,
and they wrote
about what they DID.
Movements started
with the power of
DOING,
with the power
of words.
They introduced others
to the beauty
and wonder
and peace,
and joy
found in God’s Creations,
in Mother Nature.
They partnered
with God,
with Nature,
to help folks,
the common man and woman,
feel love for
and wonder at
all God’s creations.
Because how will I
partner with,
love,
and protect
a creation
I’ve never experienced?
This was prompted by an essay on individual responsibility in environmentalism.