Poems — An attempt ...

Story of Life — June 2020

The autumn leaf that is about to fall of the branch,
The moment that captures the story of life,
The remnants of the past beauty,
The story of a full summer written on the colorfull leaf,
The decay that is the present.

The human whose life is slowly expiring;
The moment that captures the story of life,
The beauty of the past still shining through,
The signs of a full life written on the aging body,
The decay that is the present,
The death that is the emerging future.

The moment of accepting the story of life.

Note: Some artists tried to capture the moment just before a flower petal falls of, or just before a fruit goes bad. This inspired the poem.

I am grateful — Nov 11, 2015

I am grateful.
I am grateful for not have been born into a wealthy family.
I am grateful for being the person I am.
I am who I am not because everything was given to me,
I am who I am because nothing was given to me
Above the necessary to survive.
I am grateful that nothing more was given to me.
It made me a better person.
The person I am.
In return, I am giving back to the world
More than I received.

Sunset/Melancholy — Nov 10, 2015

I see the sunset.
Sunset is the moment of great melancholy.
A good day has come to an end.
A long caliginous night is coming and
We don't know who will be there to greet the next promising dawn.
Dürer's painting captures it all.

I see autumn everywhere.
Autumn is a time of great melancholy and depression.
The time of living being easily fading away.
A harsh time of short unwarmed days and long frosty nights is looming.
Not all of us will get through the coming blackness and joylessness.
Not all of us will be there to meet the gentle scents in the warm spring air.
Are we prepared for the time of perils?

I see the sunset of humanity.
I am Dürer's melancholy.
At the end of the Holocene, our long time of growing prosperity,
We are at the edge of a murk and uncertain future.
In my heart is little hope that many of us will be there to see the dawn of a new epoch.
We are not prepared.
Am I prepared for the burden of seeing reality?

Extinction — Jul 15, 2015

Some police officers kill off young, and sometimes old, black people.
I am sure, they love their pets a lot.
A lot more than they love black people.

Pouchers kill off rhinos, elephants, tigers, lions, and other trophy animals.
I am sure, they love their pets to be alive.
More than they love their preys to be alive.

We reengineer the surface of the planet
To satisfy our needs for
Areas of sprawling urban emptiness.
We build networks of concrete bands disecting the life support system of scores of species.
We don't care if species go extinct in the process.
We love our pets more than the frogs, birds, mammals whose life support is being sacrificed for our goals.

We design standardized endless planes of monocultures to feed exponential population growth.
We postulate that prosperity needs continuous growth.
We prey to an economy that inevitably increases inequity and feeds the wealth of the greedy.
We don't care if the future of our kids is diminished in the process.
We love our pets more than we love our kids.

Hearing the last love song of the last male bird of its kind calling for the female that will never come;
Seeing the picture of the last hare of its kind that will ever walk the earth,
Knowing that the last roar of the last great Siberian tiger may soon be heard,
Makes me think how hypocrite we are.

We love our pets but don't care when their ancestors vanish from the surface of the Earth.
We adore pictures of beautiful scenery but
We do not care for the originals.
We accept that forests are destroyed, Rivers redesigned and polluted, 
Open pit mines are dug into the skin of the planet like
Awful melanoma in the skin of a human body

We say we love our own kids, but
We don't care when those of others,
Of different color,
Are killed in the name of our laws.
We say we love our kids,
But we do not hesitate to
Take away their future in exchange for instant gratification
That comes from wasting more resources than necessary,
Made available to us by applying foolish technology.

We are working tiredlessly for our extinction.