Despair is not the answer…
March 24, 2023
This poem came to me as a strong message this morning, upon waking up from a dream in which I had a deep discussion with somebody I can’t remember, with insights I can’t remember. The dream was inspired by the death of a local coyote and the despair expressed by a conversation partner the night before, about the current (and ever accelerating) environmental meltdown and colonial-industrial-military-extractive-misogynistic-warandhateandfearmongering mess of destruction that is so plainly visible, in the US in particular, these days. I have enough activist friends to know how taxing it is for the heart and soul to keep working year after year when you see things only getting worse.
This poem is for my two loves. You know who you are. I wish I could wave a magic wand and whisk you away to the magical rain forest that I get to visit every day. I wish I had an answer. I wish I could take your pain away. I see and honor and love you for your work and your pain and your passion. May I remind you of what death has taught me: Grief is only a manifestation of love. Death is transformation and only an illusion, from a different perspective.
The bees may be dying,
The whales may be crying,
The politicians may be lying…
…Despair is not the answer.
The forest may be burning,
Too slowly the wheels of justice turning,
The oceans angrily churning,
… Despair is not an option.
Humanity in deep-shit trouble,
Much of the world buried in industrial rubble,
Harder and harder to live in a bubble,
…Yet we must resist despair.
While we may well be mining ourselves to death,
For precious stones,
For fields of bones,
For Ukrainian sunflowers in sepia tones.
… Despair won’t help at all.
The wild currants still flower,
The cedars still tower,
The moon in its power,
Waxing and waning,
Ebbing and flowing.
We are but specks of dust in the eternal cosmic dance
of creation and destruction.
So rise up and sparkle!
Put on the glitter!
Surrender to the music and sway to the dance!
