Let Me Kneel

A couple of weeks ago was World Environment Day.  This is a poem to honour Mother Earth.  We give and take - let us find the correct balance.

Let Me Kneel

Let me kneel upon the Earth

Raise my eyes to stormy skies

Let raindrops fall and silent slide

Down these old cheeks of mine.

 

Let me dig feeble fingers into fecund

Mud and grime, the fertile soil

Of Mother Earth.

Allow worms to squirm and slip

Through wrinkled fingers splayed

Let me sense the snail’s slime

Or butterflies breath and beating wings.

 

Let me wade in oceans blue and white

Feel waves lap at shoeless, happy feet

Let sand slip away with each lapping wave

Let waters so chill send tingling thrill

Through this ephemeral body still.

 

Let me press my forehead to kauri or miro tree

Bark to skin, sap and sweat mingled free

Hongi now, we share, we exchange our breath

Carbon, oxygen, shared elements of time and space

Let me partake of this endless, timeless cycle

Return and give, I am because you live.

 

Let me stand with storms and winds

Buffeted by elemental eddies and vortices.

 

Let my hair be blown now

Tussled, tangled by timeless truth.

 

Let me lay in open fields where shining sun

Warms and caresses naked limbs

Let photons dance and play

Synthesize with every leaf of green

 

Let life emerge and death dissolve.

Let me gaze with mournful eye

Upon moon’s reflected light, a monthly sight

Let stars collapse, be born in galaxies

Far away, yet close enough to share

Mystery, magic, and myths of time.

 

Let me one final, fruitful time

Kneel upon the earth, my time to give

My closing gift, my last offering

Let me lay, as all will some day

Breath my last and say farewell.