Dear Human at the Edge of Time
Dear Human At The Edge Of Time, let your heart be captivated by the resounding call of nature in this profound literary gem. Within these pages, weaves a symphony that speaks to its readers as it artistically and intelligently translates the voice of nature; her thoughts, her fears, her wrath, her apologies; yet, ultimately, she embraces us tenderly with a quilt of hope and remedies. In these various verses lies a profound dialogue, understanding and connection with our planet, our only home; Earth, which is now crying for our help. This collection is the perfect example that we don’t need to be scientists or politicians to mend our climate crisis, for some of these poems skilfully achieve to unveil nature’s intricate workings—by dissecting scientific notions into a simple and comprehensive language, making this collection accessible to us all—with one goal in mind; to change our perception of nature and our role as humans in this world, whereupon, after reading this anthology, it will surely prompt you to take action.
When reading these poems, one may wonder; what if children were right all along? Could it be that our collective pursuit should be to understand climate change? What if it is no longer a generational concern but rather a generational transcendence beyond the confines of posterity? And now, we realise that these young minds (just like Greta Thunberg) who have always urged us to take action and change our attitudes for decades now, cannot do it on their own. As Kyle Potvin writes in his contribution Ask the Children, “Child, when you were small you told me something / impossible was going to happen. And it did.” But the truth is, we are faced with the fact that not everyone—let alone most adults, were able to receive environmental education. In our desperation, we may ask our children “What should we do?”, only to find them with a bewildered face full of climate anxiety. We thought this would be a problem for far-off future generations, but Mother Nature has had enough, and so she keeps exhaling rivers of fiery lava upon our cities, shaking us off the very ground we stand on, burning our skins with blazing sun rays, unleashing mighty waves that drowns us and our abodes in her watery depths, leaving us breathless—as we try to gasp for clean air.
We have all watched the news, our world has turned into a climate chaos—from unexpected weather, floods and wildfires to typhoons and mass extinction of animals. Some of these poems illustrate the sorrowful situation that many families around the word are facing in real life; like Amanda M. Blake’s poem Displaced, which talks about the exile of a family after a natural disaster has torn down their house and taken the lives of many; in Eric Forsbergh’s Outside of Denver the narrator relates an intimate story of their experience in a wildfire; and Chelsea Rathburn in Someone Had Better Be Prepared For Rage who recounts the traumatic experience of being trapped in a hurricane. Moreover, David S. Maduli‘s Heterosigma akashiwo, explains how Lake Merritt‘s polluting levels and concrete drains have turned the water toxic; Melinda Koyanis’ Snow Blossoms illustrates how our uncontrolled and unseasonal weather is confusing and damaging both animals and humans; or the inventive poem of Craig Santos Perez Shall I compare thee to the anthrop’cene?; who has turned Shakespeare’s Sonnet 18 into an environmental sonnet—covering current and critical environmental topics: such as the rising levels of water, mismanagement of fossil fuels, and mass extinction. Indeed, in Ngoc Pham’s words “what are you going to do / to stop their mass extinction?”
If you are an animal lover or a landscape admirer, this collection will for sure rend you at the heartstrings, for this climate crisis is increasingly taking a toll on our beloved flora and fauna—leaving some species extinct or forcing them to migrate. Sue Davis Gabbay reminds us of those musical birds that made her mornings joyous—but now she wonders “Where are the birds? / Who will sing the morning in?”, similarly Katharyn Machan’s draws our attention to those fantastic colourful peacocks that had to escape the climate changes to survive. From Bradley Allf’s Two by Two Degrees we can feel the grief of the “Two hounds / [who] can’t take the diesel fumes”, “The salamanders holding hands in the aisle careen / through the window,” or “A bush baby clutch[ing] his rosary”… while the pilot is only busy trying to turn on the A/C. In the same way, Mary Fitzpatrick, David Maduli and Joshua McPeak try to tell us the untold and forlorn stories of this world’s animals and remind us that, as Suzanne Moser’s poem extinction crisis frames it; “every day / 150 species stop singing, flying, swimming, hunting mating, breathing, / and blooming / forever.” All of these wonderful and magical animals and landscapes that once brought us joy, beauty and nourishment, why is it all going away?
In this captivating collection, certain poets have successfully tried to explain these scientific phenomena with eloquent simplicity through a series of emotional and imaginative verses; among them, Jeremy S. Hoffman’s Paleoclimate Haiku, in which he poetically describes scientific environmental terms (such as “paleoclimatology”, “PETM carbon”, “climate proxies”, among others) with succinct, simple and playful language; or Rajiv Mohabir who takes both a scientific and political approach to the issue—by denouncing its main causes, such as the government’s negligence, consumerism and polluting corporations—as well as a list of objects found at the beach in this poem (you will be surprised by the objects listed), each contributing to the poisoning of aquatic creatures and humans alike; with Kim Roberts’ poem Prime Hook, you can also enter an insightful journey that reveals how and why water levels are rising and its disastrous effects on the anthropocene; or Ellen Taylor’s Heat, which beckons readers to understand the myriad reasons and consequences behind our planet's relentless warming and the subsequent climate changes. An evocative exploration, stirring both heart and mind, compelling us to reflect on our role in safeguarding the world we call home.
By this point in the anthology you may ask yourself; but what can I do as an individual to help our planet? Poets Karen Llagas and Everett Cruz pose this question, the first one in a spiritual way and the second one stating his desperation at the current political slumber towards the environment; as he puts it in his poem Which Ice Melts Faster?: “At the polls, we vote / to fix it, and when nobody does, they say to try / again.” His anger seethes as he witnesses the government’s callous indifference that “want us to chill, but the ice / is melting and flooding as the temperature rises.” If no one acts now, what would happen to our world? For some poets, like Molly Fisk, Eva Chen and Gail Giewont it appears to be our very doom—the extinction not only of flora and fauna, but eventually of humanity itself. Through their poems they attempt to make us feel the pain and anguish of trees falling and animals burning, and imagine a post-human world; “Perhaps, in the deepened water, / a whale will float above our ruins”. For Martha Silano it resembles an apocalypse, which she states in the way of nature’s grievances as a litany of human misdeeds to the planet, spanning from migration and extinction, and the thinning of polar ice, to the end of humankind, and thus leaving our planet Earth at peace. As she writes, “And then we were gone. And then (am I right?) the Earth sighed, broke into a blissful smile.“ If there is something that these poems want to get across is that we are standing at the precipice of nature’s breaking point; as Cassandra Bousquet so eloquently puts it, “Dear human at the edge of time, / The edge is not the end.” As long as we take the matter seriously and presently, in the same way that Luisa A. Igloria urges us to do: “We keep saying there's time, the window's still open. Until it's not." As we find ourselves on this inevitable edge, we must learn how to adapt ourselves to fly and soar like birds, lest we plummet into the abyss of our self-dug pit of doom. Taking swift action becomes paramount before the window of opportunity closes, perhaps forever. Anna Bartel show us that just like most animals striving to adapt to the new environments we put them into, we too can adapt and embrace new ways of life:
Of how we survived the collapse, We might say:
Like birds, we learned
To move as one.
We grew lighter
And lengthened our wings.”
(When we tell the story, Anna Bartel).
Some of these new ways of life may include; reducing our consumption of meat and plastics, opting for eco-friendly means of transportation, or even Collecting Beach Glass Along Lake Michigan, as E.W.I. Johnson suggests.
Each verse in this exquisite anthology tunes us into nature’s whispering symphonies to prove that our love and appreciation for nature may function as one of the strongest driving forces for taking action. Take, for instance, Ada Limón’s beautiful portrayal of the fox that “lives a life that some might call small, has a few friends, likes the grass when it’s soft and green”. These poets remind us that part of our well-being strives from “listening / to all who are speaking / beyond words — the elephants, wolves and killer whales […] the breeze / rustling the leaves, to let each / fleeting moment’s meeting / of insect, flower and bird / be savored and preserved.” (Diana Woodcock). In the same vein, Kindra McDonald sees nature as An Antidote to Our Despair; as an example she portrays a vast variety of birds and how “Research / links birdwatching with improved well-being and birdsong a reason to restore our faith in the natural order of the world.”
For some poets, like Wendi White, sympathy towards our environment can be achieved in these poems through the personification of nature—thus giving it the same value as humans. In her poem The Long View she imagines “the trees / doing the math, betting on us to return for instruction,” indeed, if trees could take action they would have already made us go back for ‘instruction’ (to learn how we should behave in the world). Or like Brian Sonia-Wallace’s poem whose narrator’s voice embodies a forest beset by a Crown of Flames—with its “long-tongued flames lick lost leaves” of pine trees. Therefore, humans must find a way to sympathise and fall back in love with nature (or rather, what’s left of nature)—like Denise Wilcox, who wants to experience nature’s wonders “Before the sun melts the glaciers, / Before the water warms too hot for whales, / And before wolves fall to extinction.”
But as Aileen Cassinetto’s hopeful poem reminds us, we must become brave ‘cavalries’, pledging to “stop the world from burning, / the seas from rising”. She reminds us that saving the planet is also an act of self-love, for we are part of nature as much as nature is part of us. Which is why, Erika Spanger talks about the importance of fostering an intimate and connective relationship with nature. As long as we keep a deeply strong love for our planet, there is still hope—“And [we’re] going to have to fight like hell” for the salvation of our precious Earth. In this beguiling collection of poetic wisdom, these writers converge on a profound truth: to rekindle the human-nature bond is to breathe life into our spirits, rediscovering our place in the intricate tapestry of existence. As we embrace the verses of these talented poets, we are awakened to traverse the path of love, empathy, and reverence for the world that cradles us, as we attempt to safeguard its splendor.
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