How can I open
my mouth to the rain? How can I not
worry about gases and other
pollutants? If I take off my shoes,
will I step on pesticides? If I lie
in the grass, will I see an earthworm
crawl out of its hole or a robin
coming to feed? If I spot an ear of corn
or billowing stalks near the roadside, will I not
take one off for fear of reprisal?
Will I not think of using the neighbor’s hose
for a drink on a hot summer day
or of asking a neighbor if I, too, could go swimming
in the pool? Perhaps if the earth
were cleaner, I’d start looking up
again, hoping for a shooting star.
Would I be more in harmony, not having
traded for prosperity? Please,
if it rains, let me be drenched,
the bee waiting only momentarily to
pollinate, the worm crawling up to
drink, the grass sprouting weeds
and crawling with insects. Please,
if you can, let the earth be
the heart that beats, the lung
that breathes.
—
Donna J. Gelagotis Lee is the author of Intersection on Neptune (The Poetry Press of Press Americana, 2019), winner of the Prize Americana for Poetry 2018, and On the Altar of Greece (Gival Press, 2006), winner of the Seventh Annual Gival Press Poetry Award. Her poetry has appeared in numerous journals internationally, including About Place Journal, Cimarron Review, The Massachusetts Review, Southern Humanities Review, and Terrain.org: A Journal of the Built & Natural Environments. www.donnajgelagotislee.com
