Mine began with boycotting grapes—
Caesar Chavez, farmworkers, wages.
Then Viet Nam Mass marches on Market Street
pussy hats, Black Lives Matter, petitions signed
doorbells rung, postcards written.
And before all that the Cold War––
a nuclear threat. At least I’d go down
waving pamphlet’s, Better Red Than Dead.
But bamboo toilet paper is a bridge too far––
I can’t save the planet 1-ply at a time
nor by short showers and a bucket of water
too heavy to carry. Let the young take over
as I languish in my rocking chair with
times past: riding rapids on the Colorado,
snorkeling off Maui’s beaches among schools
of azure Angelfish, golden Damsel and white, yellow
banners of the Pennant gliding through flourishing coral.
Never thinking beaches would erode, coral bleach
and die or the mighty Colorado recede, ebb away.
—
Laurel Feigenbaum began writing in her eighties. Poetry is her way of exploring and coping with the world in which we live and the inevitable changes that come. She is the mother of three, grandmother of seven, and great-grandmother of eight. Her work can be found in The Amsterdam Quarterly, The Marin Poetry Center Anthology, and her recent book Life In No Ordinary Time.
