UW Sustainability Courses

EARTH POEMS : Round 8

how pleasant it can be
that very first winter's snow
fluffy flakes intertwine and drift
and happily end the intra-seasonal rift
little kiddos reach out their tongues
and taste the energizing precipitation
how calming it is
this tranquil moment of wintry creation

Maureen Carroll

Fall
New house
New garden
New bulbs
Spring
Same house
Same garden
New flowers

Jenny Hermans

The luscious coolness of the fog falls on the house
As I silently watch from the balcony.
The blinding whiteness envelops me
And all is still, watching and waiting.
I am solemn, sad, respectful of the night.
I am acutely aware of my breathing, and
My soul feels tangible enough to hold.
For a moment, time seems to stand still.

Walking by the park, all is quiet
Until a sudden PLOP! As a squirrel
Abruptly falls out of a tree.
Just as suddenly as it fell, it is up again,
Scurrying back up the tree,
Never feeling sorry for itself
Or questioning its natural abilities.
I am suddenly conscious of my own
Embarrassments and hesitations,
And I sense my inability to preserve
And hit the ground running.
I feel my humanity: imperfect and beautiful.

A snowflake danced my way,
Hopping up and over invisible fence posts.
Coquettish she was,
I knew not whether she truly meant to meet me.
Eventually she found my mittened hand.
Posed there she smiled shyly at me.
Symmetrical perfection,
She took my breath away.
Then her sharp precision blurred and faded.
A miniscule puddle replaced my ravishing beauty.
I saw I knew her not for what she was.

Erin Lieg

It starts out so small in the distance
Barely a break in the horizon
Slowly it approaches
Calmly at first
Looks like whipped cream on a pan of blue Jell-O
It comes quicker
Not as calm now
You can see it building and breaking
Then building again
As it arrives
It is rushing
Racing
Trying to eat up the distance between us
Raging by the time it arrives
Like the soap in a washing machine
Tumbling over itself
Then it is here
And once again
Calm
Fading back out to the horizon

I hear the geese in the distance
As I rush out on the porch to see
The beautiful birds appear up above
Flying in a perfect V.

"Good job Johnny" I hear one say,
"Mind if I take the lead?"
"Go right ahead, Sam, you came just in time
A break is just what I need."

And so the flock
Shifted its form
In rhythm with the beating of their wings
Swiftly, unfaltering
Constantly moving forward
Recomposing itself

The beauty of natural order.

Elizabeth Keller

Snowflake

A light rain turns into the season’s first snowfall.
A snowflake falls on my nose and immediately turns liquid.

A blanket of snow covers the entirety of the ground.
Few things are as awe inspiring as a white landscape in early December.

Excitement for a new season and fresh snowfall always bubbles inside,
Until the dog days of winter set in and another snowflake draws my ire.

Cory Stinebrink

Not tonight
Another night
Drove up to the mountains
Expected swirling colors and shooting stars
Dissapointed again
Same moon and ten thousand dots
Crickets and still air still still and still chirping
No solar displays or meteors
Nor a single eclipse
Disappointed again
Just mountains and stars

Tyler George

Today I watched the clouds move in the sky,
A dinasour visited me and then vanished
A strong message to our generation.
The past always speaks to the future,
How to change and do things differently.
But have we created something better or something far worse.
Maybe everything is a passing cloud,
We exist, we move in time, and then we're gone,
Not a trace that we ever existed, only images.

Dan Axelbaum

Feline mother
Nuzzles
Charcoal kitten

Female intuition
Coaxes
Raw intention

Shelly Schwartzmann

Dead leaves dancing

The waltz of death
Within the storm
The gracefulness of leaves
Transported from their burial ground
They dance in front of me

Fran Cerami

It’s winter out here
Drove all night, now let’s hunt some deer
Back in the truck
We head up the mountain in search of a monster buck
So tired, gotta get some sleep
How’d the snow already get this deep?

Luke Dixon

Fourteen miles today to the top
Just the view and you have to turn and stop
An incredible sight
One foot in front of the other with all my might
It truly takes your breath away
What an incredible day

Luke Dixon

God took the strength of a mountain,
The majesty of a tree;
The warmth of a summer sun,
The calm of a quiet sea;
The generous soul of nature,
The comforting arm of night;
The wisdom of the ages,
The power of the eagle’s flight.
Then God combined these qualities.
There was nothing more to add.
His masterpiece was now complete
He lovingly called it, Dad.

Luke Dixon

Head-on Into the Storm

Shaken but still hard as stone
Sure you’d miss me when I’m gone
Face to face is how we’ll fight
Because we need to put it right.

We did not sail away
When others just escaped
We did not seek for shelter
And now it’s much too late

One last time I see your face
And you look thru my eyes
Before we head into the storm
That might blow us apart.

Straight thru the whipping rain
I never knew we’d like the pain
When we want left, we just turn right
Can’t reach the shores, no guiding light.

We did not sail away
When others just escaped
We did not seek for shelter
And now it’s much too late

We’re caught in the storm
And you look into my eyes
We cannot stand the storm
That will blow us apart

We rode the tide until we broke
And shipwrecked at the cliffs of life
Deep in the trough we look above
Waiting for a wave of love…

Florian Laux

Winter’s Gift

Open the sky and flush the seasons down
Each with a hello, a goodbye, and a gift
Blooming flowers, a burning sun, changing colors
Each sends the heart and mind adrift

Though each is precious
One is more.
That which stands alone and is great
Winter’s gift:
The fall of the first snow flakes

From heaven comes the white
The busy flurries demonstrate grace
In the sky dancing, dancing
Upon the Earth, disappearing without a trace

Their lullaby is a quiet one
A gentle welcome to Winter and all it will bring
The winter is welcome
For that first snowfall
That makes the heart sing.

Adam Schlicht

Sand dunes – an event in history
Because some grass
And some winds
Got together and collected some sand
Well, sit here on this dune
And listen to the meditation
Of Lake Michigan
Breathe
But don’t –
Whatever you do –
Look to the right
At the factories
And the giant smokestacks
That are actually only a half a mile away
Because if you don’t see ‘em
For just a moment
Caught in the rocking of the shoreline
You can pretend
That they don’t exist.

Elissa Chasen

4 Seasons

It’s hard to know where it starts
Does the chicken have the egg
Or the egg have a chicken?
But I think it begins in the summer
‘cause that’s where it all began for me.
Luscious leaves a lovely green
That orchestrate a living symphony
Of wind and birds and bugs and things
That all give way to an earthly rainbow
Where the sky is blue
The leaves red, orange, yellow and green
This is where colors were born
And this is where colors die
And give way to brown stark branches
Silhouettes against a gray sky
Where my life becomes routine
Just to try and stay warm
Or to be cold just to be warm again
That’s the hot chocolate
Until a bird makes a peep
And a tree makes a sprout
One by one
Blossoming leaves that overcome the
Winter and bring on the spring.

The squirrel
driven to
find and bury
find and bury
adapted to
cities and sidewalks
understands
the roar of an engine
the impenetrability of concrete
the nuts still fall
from above, but
the squirrel must
expand his range

Betsy Lawton

The palate of the Earth
The texture of the sky
The music of the flow
The connection.

Betsy Lawton

how hot the sun is
up on the way to the brilliantly burning
on top of my head can almost
reach it momentarily
still striving for it when
oops, it’s gone obscured
blurred behind a happy little cloud (thank you Bob Ross)
which itself gives way to a proud firmament
of roiling gray barreling rapidly across the sky
a grumbling, rumbling God’s beer belly
and all of a sudden
CRASH thrash kaboom
anger fills the room
and the world goes dark
as my heart equally shades itself
hides away
and I follow its beat
crawl under a rock
metal mountaineering trinkets
once could save my life
now beacons for the sky’s boundless anger
I notice the moisture seeping through my shoe
so screwed droplets turn to flakes
and float around me
the calm is an obscenity
as my heart thunders louder than all else
only noise to reach my ears
is humming
bee sting style
and realization of what that there is
washes over me
like ice water
bringing me face to face
with the vast expanse of
what will follow
and my reverie is shattered
split down the middle
tattered
a clean piercingly beautiful bolt
falls to the left of me
and as I raise my dazed
head off the ground
I come up with something
truly profound
I would be lucky to tell my story someday.

Paula Wild