Plain American Language

Today the world is bright,

is drier than most other days: it is fifty degrees

in February, almost fourty eight in the shade--

the cool breath of the wind

so thoughtful on most days in springtime

whispers in haiku syllables

five, then seven, then five accounts of how

global warming will not end, that we will suffer,

and the glaciers will melt

and I will die and everyone will die

but we will be warm, and our shoes will sink

into the loving earth that cushions us,

cradles our bodies as we lie onto it,

breathing in the breath of eternal summer

and honeysuckles and disappearing bees

and bears kept in museums and poetry

kept in museums, locked in glass cases like

so much fruit in the grocery stores

and the grocery stores filled with bright, beautiful

yellows, pinks, purples and oranges,
vegetables and leaves will forever be green

and green will be the flag because there will

be no nations, there will only be earth

and water and the few people

who populate this world,

as we dangle our shoes over the edge

trying to remember what winter

used to mean when it took us over in February.