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I first posted this poem two years ago. A year later, when we were under lockdown and the noise of engines fell silent and wild animals walked the streets, it seemed that nature just might have a chance, but once again, pollution spews, plastic continues to fill the oceans and the ice caps are melting even more quickly. Today, Earth Day 2021, I find my poem is just as relevant, maybe more so.
Image credit: Mother Earth by gedomenas
Little innocent one, so new to the world,
sniffing the air and feeling the breeze.
Is there a place for you?
Little innocent one, so new to the world,
feeling the smoke sting your eyes.
I fear for you.
What will you do when they cut down the trees
and just a patch of your forest is left?
Where will you run when the hunters come
to take you far from your home?
Oh Humanity, think what you’re doing!
Don’t you know her fate
is our future too?
Written in response to Sadje’s What Do You See #41 photo prompt.
Image credit: Lewis Roberts on Unsplash
Meditating in the moment
watching silent wings beat softly
in bright iridescence
inhaling the essence
of fragrant flowers
before being laid to rest
on their beautiful bower.
She, who today, has been chosen
to atone for all our sins
the balm to soothe the breast
of our broken mother, Gaia.
Written in response to Sadje’s What Do You See #37 photo prompt.
Image credit: Stefan Keller on Pixabay
The Cutesy-Pie Snow-People were the craze of the century that Christmas. Their sweet little faces and animated features melted the hardest of hearts, and by mid-December every garden, balcony and complex had their own little Cutesy-Pie.
Everyone feared what would happen to the cute little creatures come the thaw. People cleared spaces in their freezers and banded together to rented chill-rooms to accommodate them for the warmer months.
But as the snow melted the Snow-People hardened. They began to grow taller and slimmer. They lost their sweet expressions and threw off their quirky hats. People stared out at them with a new fear. Were their cute little Snow-People going to turn on them?
Then one morning as the sun rose and cast its strengthening rays over the land, the Snow-People took to the air, rising up, glinting in the sunlight like so many ice angels.
They banded together and flew north.
Satellites tracked the angels’ progress; the feed was live-streamed into every home. People watched and waited. Then, as the first light dawned over the northern pole, the angels descended. Their bodies merged with the melting glaciers and re-froze the recent permafrost.
Together the Snow-People undid the damage of decades.
Written in response to Sadje’s What Do You See #29 photo prompt.
Image credit: Alexas Photos on Pixabay
It was widely assumed that Afterwards everything would go back to Normal.
Whatever that had been. Few remembered.
Thomas had never imagined this though. That Mother Earth would exact her revenge on the human race like this.
It could have been worse, he reflected. Being a tree wasn’t so bad.
Written in response to Sadje’s What Do You See #27 photo prompt.
Image credit: Willgard on Pixabay
Great Being Five had been twiddling her thumbs for too long at the Academy for Wisdom¹. Over the decades she’d re-educated many recalcitrant Great Beings and re-engineered their wrong-doings. She’d set them all back on the straight and narrow, repentant of their misdeeds in the management of their planets. But now she was bored.
True, she still retained responsibility for two planets, but one was still at the ‘rocks and slime stage’ and the other, Orea, the one she used to love so much, with its pretty pastel colours and cute, fluffy life-forms, was… well, just a little bit dull.
Five was missing her beautiful blue planet. Planet Earth, which she’d finally decided to delete² back in Earth Year 2033, before the greedy, selfish little humans destroyed it themselves and took off to infect another planet.
She missed those fallible little creatures. Back in the day, before they had too many technical toys at their disposal, they were such fun. So creative! Five sighed as a wave of nostalgia broke over her desk and splashed off her Universal Viewing Screen.
Back in the day. The thought crossed and re-crossed her mind.
It lingered while a plan formed.
She’d done it before, and she could do it again. As a top official in the Academy, she had both the authority and the autonomy. All she needed to do was turn back Time in that small solar system on the edge of the Milky Way.
Once before she’d re-set Planet Earth, but sadly it hadn’t had much effect; soon the arrogant little inhabitants were back on the road to their inevitable existential fate. This time needed to be different. A planet-wide change of mind-set must be effected.
She knew just the Being to help her.
Five dropped a mind message to her first re-education subject, the one she knew best and her greatest success. She immediately sensed his enthusiasm for the project. He was primed and ready for action. She would take care of the Time-Grid and he would set up the means for a mind-set change.
He warned her it would be radical.
He warned her it would be tough.
He warned her it would take time.
She agreed.
Five aligned the Time-Grid: 01.01.2020.
A nice round number; not long before The Total Tipping Point.
She sat back. Watched and waited.
Planet Earth reappeared in its old position. The little humans had ceased their scurrying. They’d hunkered down and huddled in their homes. Five was saddened at the sickness and the suffering; the deaths of the elderly, the poorly and the poor.
The Earth turned and turned again
day after day
month after month.
Skies cleared. Rivers ran clean. Nature thrived and re-asserted itself.
The planet cooled down a little.
When the scourge passed, the little humans emerged. They had changed and the change came from within; a new understanding of their beautiful blue planet.
Five mind-melded with her colleague: thanks, Nineteen.
She hoped her little humans would get it right now.
¹ For the Greater Good
² And finally she pulled the plug
Photo credit: watercolour painting by Elena Mozhvilo
Look away, my love. Remember it as it was. Listen to the birdsong swelling in a clear blue sky, hear the insects hum, feel the joy of the new lambs dancing in our fresh green fields.
Fix it in your mind. Our little farmhouse with its pretty garden. Smell the lavender you planted by the door, feel the cool breeze on your skin as it flutters the flower-sprigged curtains which you made last summer.
Let us go now, my love. Don’t look back. Let us leave this black and broken land and find a place where we can start anew.
Written in response to a prompt from Susan T. Braithwaite
Genre Scribes Friday Fiction Writing Challenge #28
The challenge this week was damage.
Up in the tall, tall tree, the little spider monkey hugged her infant to her chest. The air was thick and yellow-brown. The bright burning was coming. Clutching her baby she descended. It was time.
The creatures of the forest, predator and prey together, were gathering, deep in the mystical heart of the jungle. Silently they formed a circle around Her Sacred Place, wingtip to paw, talon to claw. The huge black jaguar turned his head and gazed amber-eyed at the little spider monkey, but she wasn’t afraid.
The people of the forest emerged from the trees. They lay down their bows and quietly joined the circle. The little spider monkey looked up. High in the canopy, the spirits of the forest shimmered.
They waited. And prayed.
Mother Gaia rose from the earth. She threw back her head and opened her mouth wide. Her ululation filled the air. The lament grew. The creatures of the forest joined in. The air vibrated.
On the other side of the ocean, the Powerful People were chomping their way through a lavish lunch, while discussing the iniquity of inequality and admiring the ocean view.
The crystal glasses began to rattle. Then a wave, shaped like a monstrous hand, rose up from the ocean. Huge watery fingers plucked the Powerful People from their table and dropped them into the sea one by one where they bobbed and floundered.
The hand closed into a fist and rose skyward, speeding away and disappearing over the western horizon. As it neared opposite continent the fist unclenched and scooped up a massive handful of ocean.
Cool air ruffled the little spider monkey’s fur. She smelt the moisture in the air and heard the hiss of the dying flames. Mother Gaia began to sing the sweetest song the little spider monkey had ever heard. And the forest breathed again.
The water receded around the Powerful People leaving them standing on the beach. Sweet music filled the air. They stood and waved proudly to the crowd, as if claiming victory from the sea. But then the waves rolled back. The Powerful People were no longer waving. They were drowning.
From my Flash Fiction Collection
And now there was nothing left of what had been her beautiful blue planet. Great Big Five sighed. She had given them chance after chance. She had very nearly deleted the entire human race in Earth Year 2018. Only that little message which flashed up after she had hit the big red button had given her pause.
Do you really want to DELETE?
No, she hadn’t. She’d cancelled the request. Sat back and watched and waited for fifteen Earth Years more. She’d watched the greedy, selfish humans squander more and more of the precious resources of her pretty planet. Barren soil blew away, the oceans turned to acid, the very atmosphere was toxic. Some of the little humans had tried to avert the crisis. They’d spoken out. Even important, influential ones had acted, added their voices. There were protests, social media campaigns, new policies agreed and implemented; the planet had staggered on, but it was all too little, too late.
Meanwhile others had been working on a plan. Done with the Earth, they would move on. Move to another planet. Their neighbour: the red planet. Clever little humans!
Never mind what they’d done to the animals and birds, the trees and flowers, the mountains and lakes. All her best work they’d left in tatters.
She had mind-melded with Great Being Nineteen. The red planet was under his jurisdiction. She had suspected he had plans. With Earth out of the way, he could move his smaller red planet nearer to its sun, into what her imaginative earthlings called the Goldilocks Zone, after one of their sweet little stories. Allow something new to evolve. He’d even let her collaborate on his project.
You have activated Planet Total Destruction. Are you sure you want to do this?
She did.
They couldn’t be allowed to spread their wicked ways.
©2019 Chris Hall
Take a last look at the world we call Home. You’ll never see it again. After this generation, and maybe the next, nobody will. It won’t exist.
And we, brave comrades, will not see our next home, nor the several generations which will succeed us. Our new home is far, far too distant. Almost too distant to contemplate. It lies beyond our own planetary system, beyond anything visible to our eyes. Only our most powerful telescopes can see; reached only by a single exploratory probe which has travelled over many of our lifetimes.
Thus our new home has been identified. All available data indicates it is suitable for life. Or was. Remember we are travelling such a very great distance across the galaxy, that what we know about this planet is only its past.
But we are optimistic. No other race could have been so stupid. No other beings would wantonly destroy their planet.
So, brave comrades, we boldly go, across to the westward arm of the great spiral galaxy, to a group of eight planets which orbit a sun, just like ours. Our destination is the third from that sun, a blue planet, and we will call it Home.
luna's on line 