poem: Mother Nature's Got a Thermo-Sprayed Bob

Mother Nature's Got a Thermo-Sprayed Bob

Our Earth looks tame to the eyes above her;
Our jetstreams waltz to a languid tune.
We're blue as Neptune, but heavier, wetter;
With seas that yearn for our burnt toast Moon,
We're not like Venus who's steeped in sulfur,
Nor Mars nor Mercury bleak as noon.

Across our sky is a lace-white maze
Pooped out by queues of passing jets.
Here on Fourteenth Street, shirtsleeve workers
Erupt outdoors to light cigarettes
They'll cough out their lungs to the souped up haze
That smothers the Sun before it sets.

With reddened mouth, with bleached white grin,
Meteora conjures intense precip,
But her bob never stirs while her arms describe
A clipper's blast or derecho's rip.
"The blossoming pears will be snowed in --
Now let's watch a scary tornado clip!"

Her front shoves past and the ozone drops;
From the murk come profiles of vale and bluff.
Forget the smoke from our bygone past!
We've dealt pollution a swift rebuff.
Here's to clearcuts! to hybridized crops!
To Stickstoff! Sauer- und Kohlenstoff!

Ah, Meteora, we've lost our shoon!
But you're lookin' swell -- you got no regrets!
If deserts are going to come claim us soon,
Then a fireman conducted the Boston Pops!
Our midden persists though our lust forgets;
It'll be there to read in the rock outcrops.

And, Mami! We're bound to wreck this ship:
I don't think our atmosphere's vast enough!

          -- Leslie G. Harper
              February 19, 2008