Tahlequah

Midst the pandemic -

news: Tahlequah is pregnant -

note of joy and hope

for earthweal's open link: https://earthweal.com/

Tahlequah is the orca who carried her dead calf on her nose, grieving, for seventeen days and a thousand miles some time back. She broke all our hearts. I pray this time her calf will live. Which depends, as always, on humans.

POEMS HIDE

Poems hide

in the rafters, growing dusty

on days when we don't write.

Bored, they grow restive,

waiting for our us to pick up our pens,

gaze at the ceiling, brains slowly moving

into inner space, trusting words

will arrive, as they always do,

most often unspectacularly.

Poems hide

in the midst of a pandemic,

when the number of the dying

grows beyond what a mind can encompass;

when the level of hostility in the world

keeps us hiding, along with our poems,

in our safe living rooms,

tending our wounded hearts,

our dashed dreams,

our floundering hope.

Poems hide

when we wonder

if we will ever again

write a lyrical poem

about sunshine and flowers and beauty;

they hide, like our dusty old dreams

of a world where justice and integrity lead

and the rest of us follow.

Wild Writing inspired by "Valentine for Ernest Mann", a poem including the line "Poems hide" by Naomi Shihab Nye.

IN THE PRESENCE OF THE SACRED

This is the Hanging Garden Tree, on the Tall Tree Trail

on Wah'nah'juss, otherwise known as Meares Island. 

This island lies across the harbour from Tofino,

a sacred forest filled with ancient beings

and wild creatures. I have felt a sacredness 

there more than in any cathedral.

On Wah'nah'juss, 10,000 Nuu chah nulth lived pre-contact. Only a few hundred survived, by going deep into the forest for years, to wait out the devastation of the smallpox epidemic brought by the settlers.

I am Hanging Garden Tree,
my thick trunk hosting
an abundance of life forms,
diverse and vital;
garlanded with root and vine,
with fern and flower,
a universe within my leafy bower.

I am home to Sky Creatures, all the winged ones,
Owl and skyhawk, murrelet and swallow;
small furry-pawed ones dart among my branches
and nestle soft within my sleepy hollows.

A thousand fern fronds
drape fringed shawls along my shoulders,
soft moss, green lichen and fat mushroom clinging,
climbing vine that wraps itself around me
and, in my hair, a hundred starlings, singing.

Myriad insect worlds I tend and harbor.
I shelter bear and wolf, am food for deer.
To all Two-Leggeds who come before me, seeking,
I offer peace within my silent arbor.

Young Standing People upon my branches grow.
They came through me, nurtured the best I know.
Roots fattened with the seasons of my living,
they stretch beyond my reach now, one by one,
as I support their separate struggle
towards the sun.

In this the season of my deep reflection
I'm tired now; I have endured an age.
At dusk, Sky Woman comes,
serene and sage,
to scatter stars about my weary head,
while Sister Moon

sends me such perfect dreams,
I'm spirit-fed, and morning comes
too soon.

In this grove we're in
the presence of the sacred:
sharing our breath,
our tenancy of earth and sky,
interconnected to all the Four Directions
by the Love to which we all belong,
under the grace of a Celestial Eye,
all singers of the universal song.

The Hanging Garden Tree has an abundance of life forms growing on it, ferns, mushrooms, moss and smaller trees. As a single mother of four, I relate to the strength it takes, to support so much growth.

Shared with earthweal for Brendan's prompt: Sacred Landscapes. I am fortunate to live on such sacred landscape, close to these ancient beings.

Love In the Ruins

[title from the poem of the same title by Jim Moore]

I remember when tables had tablecloths,
fancy ones kept folded in a drawer,
used only for special occasions,
one plain and serviceable
for every day.

I remember my Grandma's small living room,
with card tables set up for the ladies'
afternoons of bridge: tea in Baleek cups,
small, damp sandwiches. The women
wore hats and white gloves to the wrist.

I remember when ironing was a weekly chore,
when washing was hung out on the line
Monday before 8 a.m.,
and women compared the whiteness
and looked droll over the neighbour
who got her washing out late.
(I don't remember ever seeing
underwear on my Grandma's clothesline.
Underwear was unmentionable back then,
along with so much else.)

I remember when love lived
at my grandparents' house,
and the aunts and uncles were all
beautiful and glamourous,
coming out the door of
the little wartime cottage
in those days of apple orchards,
fresh-smelling mornings,
and sweet lake breezes.

I remember when love itself was in ruins,
my heart like a battered little boat,
trying to make its way to safety
across perilous seas.

I remember when love was a black wolf,
who had a toothy grin and made me laugh.
He is still love, ten years dead,
missed every day.

Right here, right now, covid is spiking again,
a thousand deaths in one day in the USA,
where masks have become a political issue,
instead of a means of
keeping each other safe.

Right here, right now,
on my tv screen,
goons in camoflauge,
sent by the President,
are yanking mothers off the street,
taking them away in unmarked cars.
Yes, I mean America; not a foreign country.

Right here, right now, our long-ago dreams
of peace and justice have long since died.
We're living in the ruins of our best hopes,
looking for leaders in a world gone mad.
We're hoping we'll survive.


Wild Writing with Laurie Wagner

When You Love a Wild Thing III

When you love a wild thing,
you can never again return
to being tame.
He'll take you farther
than you'd ever go alone,
after which you'll never
be the same.

He was a wild thing,
and he shared my wild
and wilderness-y  heart.
We gamboled endless
sandy beaches, never apart
through the happiest
and wildest of our years,
and, when we had to leave,
we mourned together
our lost home with inner tears,
the way all wild
and displaced creatures
grieve.

He was a wild one,
and in all my life,
he was my dearest friend.
He was himself,
black wolf who loved me,
to the end.
He made me laugh
as untamed wild things
always will,
living all his life
with a spirit too big
to kill.

He loved me more
than anyone I ever knew,
so it was harder than I dreamed
when our years together
were through.
And, when he went away,
though he tried so hard to stay,
most of my heart went with him,
for pain is the price
love pays.

Forever now, I'll listen
for his song.
I will miss him every day
all my life long.
From the moment
his heart stopped beating,
from the hour we had to part,
I've been a weary wolf woman
with wolf howls
in my heart.


Another poem about my black wolf, written in 2018.  I have written a book full of poems about this wonderful creature. He shared my happiest years. Ten years after his death, I still miss him every day. The phrase "a spirit too big to kill" comes from my friend Annell, who wrote it soon after he died. I am so grateful for our fourteen years together.

Shared with earthweal's open link.

What Belongs To Us

Not the rented rooms
where I live my present life,
not even the rented breaths,
never knowing when the last one will come,

not the four chicks sent out into the world,
their inner clocks set to Forward,
no looking back to see me
waving on the shore

not the dogs I loved and lost,
their smiles and hearts and devotion
missed every day of my life since

not even these words,
coming from I know not where.
I set them down on the page,
to capture them,
but pages can be burnt,
or lost, or discarded
by those who come after me.

What is ours? In the end,
only the love we have given
and shared, the memories
we have made, the stories
others will tell about us
after we are gone.


Wild Writing with Laurie Wagner, from a poem by Marie Howe

Birds

A poem should always have birds in it,

the poet said. And
A person wants to stand in a happy place
in a poem.

My poems are often full of birds.
But they are having a hard time out-shouting
the black-hearted rhetoric spewing
from my tv screen,
that makes my heart sink
and forget how to sing.

How can we stand in a happy place
in the poem of our lives
while stormtroopers are beating
and firing upon peaceful citizens,
and veterans and mothers?
While people are abusing animals
and hating each other?
Where the world is in survival mode
and has forgotten how to be kind?

I can tell you that, down by the shore,
herons are picky-toe-ing peacefully
along the mudflats.
I can point out the eagle, surveying
his kingdom from the top of a scrag.
I can show you my balcony
full of chattering jays
and swift little hummers,
all living in blessed ignorance
of the weight we humans are carrying.

Bless them.
When we look up for a moment
to track their heartlifting passage
across the sky,
we remember what it once was
to dream.

inspired by "Singapore" by Mary Oliver. The italicized lines are hers.

Becoming Still

Maybe I need to stop reacting to all
the cruelty and injustice in the world,
and centre down into life inside
these four walls, sliding door open to
the pretty blooms on my balcony,
turning towards the sun,
the chattering jays who let me know
when they need the sunflower seeds
topped up in the feeder.

"Become still," the poet said,
"then reach out with your heart."

Life is beautiful, in my village;
people are conscious and caring,
respectful and grateful.
We are surrounded by nature's wild beauty;
we  know we are blessed.
In the bigger world, crowds rage
against oppression and a growing fascism.
In the bigger world, there are pandemics,
both physical and spiritual.
The way we were is gone;
the way we are is untenable.
But, still, brave souls are marching,
demanding a more just world.

I watch, from my couch,
exhausted by my 74 years of living,
the worst the last three and a half,
when my idealism, my persistent optimism,
my belief in the transformation
of consciousness
slowly sank under black venomous rhetoric,
that spread like the virus,
creating two polarized communities
with an abyss floating between them.

Who will come with large enough vision
to build the bridge that will allow us
to meet?
When will the rainbow warriors
arrive?

Wild Writing with Laurie Wagner
inspired by Pandemic by Lynn Ungar

WHEN YOU LOVE A WILD THING II

When you love a wild thing

your heart becomes wild too.

You gallop together joyously

along deserted beaches

to the roar of the waves

with an exultant song

of freedom in your heart.

You track through old growth forests,

padding gently on the mossy floor,

alert for other critters

in the bush.

You walk the beach

to the moo of Lennard's Light,

in fog so thick that others' voices

are disembodied spirits

that emerge, startled and laughing,

when you get close.

When you love a wild thing,

your heart soars with eagles

and is tethered to the land

only by love.

When you love a wild thing,

the bond of devotion

runs deeper than any human

you have ever encountered

was capable of.

And when you lose a wild thing,

your heart resists

its return

to being tame.

for my prompt at earthweal: Messages from and encounters with the wild.

The Owl is the Doorway Into the Unknown

[The title is a quote from The Golden Cauldron by Nicki Scully] written September 13, 1999

I sit beside my mother's bed
as she lies dying.
Our eyes meet: all the words we cannot say,
all the missed connections,
misperceptions,
in this lifetime,
it has always been
this way.

I release the ways
we never got it right;
forgive, no need to hold the anger tight.
Just "I love you"
and her spirit
flies away,
out of the room
into the starry night.

Weeks later,
I am driving
towards her home
when, in slow motion,
across my windshield
flies
a grey owl,
feathered being,
infinitely wise,
as she passes looking
deep into
my eyes.

Time is suspended
on this point
of traveling.
Somehow I feel
a message has been
received
and, somewhere in my spirit sore,
unraveling,
I know all is understood
and I believe.

Owl, swooping sideways
into the forest green,
bird between two worlds,
all that we know and the unseen,
harbinger of change,
of mysteries beautiful and strange,
as our eyes meet
I know an Oracle
has been.

Wise watcher in the night,
friend of the moon,
fly after she
who left my world
too soon.

Fly, messenger
of my belated transformation;
and give my love to my mother
in the Spirit Nation.

for my prompt at earthweal, where we contemplate encounters with and messages from the wild.

Dogs With Haloes

source

The haloes, during this time
of covid,  are multiplying,
but so is the darkness.
This morning, on the news,
I watched a young man lift,
then slam, his dog down hard
on the pavement, twice.
The police came to
the dog's rescue,
and did he cower, having been
so cruelly treated just minutes before?
No, he wagged his tail,
because that is how
hopeful and forgiving
dogs are. I sobbed and sobbed.

It is like the evil emperor poked
the festering underbelly
that had been in hiding,
and gave it permission to spread.
The pus seeped out and is infecting
everything near and far,
like the virus itself.

Humans can't handle this much darkness.
I know I can't.
"Grief and holiness are all we know,"
the poet said.
This morning, what holiness there is
lives in an abused dog's wagging tail.
As for humanity, my heart aches
at how the people
in this world seem to have
collectively
gone mad.

Wild Writing with Laurie Wagner
Inspired by The Pandemic Halo by Jim Moore

Happiness Is........

It's Saturday, and I want to tell you something
about happiness. It comes on soft little feet
into your life when you aren't even looking.
It taps you on the shoulder, disguised as
a dog you pass on the beach, a smile
from a stranger that says "people are good",
a special treat you buy yourself just because.

It reveals itself in the pot full of
tightly closed buds you brought home
from the nursery when, one morning,
you step onto your balcony to find
some of them open, and reaching for the sun.

It fills your heart when you breathe in
the early morning,
and it smells like summer mornings
when you were a child
at Grandma's house, your safest
place in the world.

You may not be thinking about anything,
but watching a cloud perch itself
on top of the rounded hills
across the harbour, your heart swells
to overflowing at the beauty:
happy, happy, happy
and
grateful, grateful, grateful.

Happiness is seeing nature's beauty,
all around through awakened eyes.
It lives in the song of the waves,
an eagle's cry, the sight of a heron
perched on the topmost branch
of an old growth cedar,
and you wonder how the branches
hold his weight and how
his feet find purchase.

It happens when a hummingbird flies,
by accident, inside your house.
You cup its featherweight lightness
in your hands, walk outside,
and set her free. Her darting flight
away from you is just how happiness is:
you don't want to hold it too tightly;
you know it needs its freedom
to come and go. Cupped hands,
only for a moment, and then release.
You know it always will
come back.

Wild Writing with Laurie Wagner

When You Dare to Dream a Little Dream

This is what life does. It brings you out of the desert, where you had felt displaced for so long, your spirit falling silent, and plunks you down beside the sea. Joyous, invigorated, enlivened, pinching yourself in disbelief and gratitude, you repeat the mantra daily: “I’m here! I did it! I made my dream come true!”

This is what life does: it brings illness, no employment, so you have to sell your little trailer and move away from the source of all that joy. It demands that you learn to be happy in the last place on earth you ever wanted to live. So, over time, you do. And, only then, it allows you to return to the sea.

What a reunion! Smiling starfish, giggly anemone waving their little arms, happy grinning dogs lolloping along the beach, sea-song, sunrises and sunsets beautiful enough to break your heart.

You are old now, so you hobble, not lope, along the beach, cane tapping. But you are still grinning, like someone reuniting with that one lover you never stopped loving, and it is even better for having missed them for so long.

This is what life does: it dares you to dream an impossible dream and, if you trust, and believe, and refuse to give it up, it helps you to make it possible. Sometimes not just once, but twice.

Wild Writing with Laurie Wagner

Voices of the Wild

I am polar bear
crawling across a melting landscape,
just skin and bone when I
finally expire

I am Tahlequah, mother orca,
carrying my dead calf on my nose
for seventeen days,
unable to let her go

I am small terrified monkey
waiting in too-small cage
to be placed on the barbecue
in Wuhan

I am wolf
shot at from helicopters
as I run,
no safe place to hide

I am koala and kangaroo
fleeing the wildfires.
I am wild horses
with burning hooves
fleeing across a smoking landscape

I am indigenous matriarch
weeping for the destruction of
my homeland and
the genocide of my people

I am old growth forest
the last of my kind,
the lungs of the planet,
being chopped down
as swiftly as
temperatures soar

I am the voice of the wild,
of Mother Earth,
speaking in all of her voices
a message we humans
refuse or just cant bear
to hear.


for Grace's prompt at dVerse: I Am.......I chose to speak for those who have no voice. I will share this at earthweal's open link as well.

A Moment

The moving truck turned the corner

at the top of the hill 

and there it was,

spread out below me -

Long Beach,

stretching long and golden,

with a huge fiery red sun

perched atop the forest,

just ready

to go down.

The sky was molten,

on fire, orange

and red and glorious.

We turned into the driveway

lined with old growth trees,

and we were there -

my cabin on the beach,

for my first winter in Tofino.

Out in the bay,

a small whale was surfacing 

and diving.

One dream,

come true,

to the max.

And I knew

that I was home.

for Brian (yay!!!!!) And the team at dVerse. Congratulations on eight wonderful years. This poem is about my first arrival in Tofino in 1989. I lived my dream for ten glorious years, then had to leave due to illness. In 2017, the universe granted me another dream I had been unable to give up on: I got to return to my soul's home, after mourning it for so long. I have been praying prayers of gratitude ever since. Not everyone gets to have a dream come true, not once, but twice. With some of us, We dont choose Tofino; Tofino chooses us.

Shifting Baselines

source

With shifting baselines,
every day another consternation
or outrage of injustice to contemplate,
we become like frogs,
leaping from lilypad to lilypad
in a churning swamp,
too busy keeping afloat
to remember
the wildfires that will come again,
the melting poles,
the warming atmosphere
now that we resignedly accept
without an eyeblink
that we will never meet
emission targets in time.

A torpor of the spirit, a vast ennui,
a resignation falls upon my
once so hopeful heart.
I Become the Observer
of the mad societal dance.
We learn too late
that we must change or die.

The ancestors are weeping on the wind.
The planet turns and burns.
More wild things die.
In quiet moments,
I can almost hear their mournful cries.


for Brendan at earthweal: Shifting Baselines where he astutely describes we humans "frogging the boil", such an awesome description. I can't even wrap my head around the number of deaths from covid. Each one a heartbreak.

Beloved

Sweet little village,
everything one needs at
the main intersection: post office,
CoOp grocery, and a view of the harbour;
across the water, Wah'nah'juss - stately, regal,
guardian of Nutchuks, which means
all along the mountains.
Wispy clouds grace its peaks
this sunny summer morning.
My heart expands.

At the beach, sitting on a log in the sun,
my eyes trace the familiar
wind-sculpted shapes
of the trees on c̓ixʔwatsac,
each time comfortingly the same,
grounding my vision.

Sky and sand and sea,
surf and clouds and small forested islands,
a heart full of gratitude -
and everything,
everywhere I look,
beloved.

Blackbird Heart

For thirty years,
you've been in my rearview mirror:
with your dark blackbird heart,
smiling at me across the greenhouse,
with a small bird
alighting on your hand.

The doves woke us up every morning.
It was summer,
lake-scent and whisperings
engraved forever
on my heart.

You aren't on the planet any more.
But you're still there
in my rearview mirror
every time I think of love,
and summer, weeping willow,
the doves cooing at daybreak
just before our love
was gone.


for The Sunday Muse

Wondrous

Getty Image

These days are showing us
the depths and heights of what it is
to be human.
We are revealed in all of our multiplicity:
destructive, seeing Other instead of fellow human,
taking too much, not giving enough back.
But, also, heroic, bringing forth our best gifts
to reach out to others, to help, to encourage,
to inspire. We feel the pain and sorrow -
yet sing our song of joy
that we are here, on this beautiful planet,
when we remember to look
with our soul's eyes and see
how it was always meant to be.

There is no language for this moment yet,
but still we strive to find the words:
heartbroken, fearful, discouraged,
afraid to hope, with our broken dreams
in shards around us. Yet a stubborn flame
still flares in our hearts. We can do this:
the work of healing the world and each other.

I think it is pretty serious right now.
My heart aches with the pain and the beauty,
side by side - the pain of all we are losing
so quickly - in such numbers our brains cant hold
the enormity of the loss.

It is a sad math.
This is what I am trying to tell you.
We need to change it all,
to save what's left.

Wild Writing with Laurie Wagner, inspired by the poem Wondrous by Sarah Freligh

Standing on the Edge of the Edge of the Apocalypse

This exercise in Wild Writing is inspired by Dreaming the Apocalypse by Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer. Italicized lines are hers.

Standing on the edge of
the edge of
the apocalypse,
I set my vision as far as the horizon,
pondering all that lies between
now and the farthest day
I can imagine.

What holds me up?
Love of and belief in Mother Earth,
old growth trees, wild waves,
every dog I see and all the
furred and winged creatures
who share this world
with me.

What you cannot see changes you.

Small invisible droplets
have changed the world.

There is a sky behind the sky.
Set your sights far.
The earth goes down for miles;
we walk on layers of the past
and the ashes of our ancestors.

Listen for their voices on the wind.
They will tell you
all you need to know
about survival through hard
and questionable times.
They will tell you
the only thing for certain
is change itself.

We once thought change was a problem.

And now we know:
we either change or die.



Shared with earthweal's open link.

UBUNTU

I am well if you are well,
we say to each other.
That part is easy.
But how can I be well
when animals are suffering and dying?
when the tundra and the icebergs are melting,
and Mother Earth everywhere is crying -

while the general population,
distracted by our many daily woes,
can't open our minds wide enough
to see how far we all still have to go?

I have carried my earth grief
for an age, seeing the beauty blaze,
and the destruction rage,
on this planet blue and green,
once so pristine,
that we have ravaged at such cost,
I can't see far beyond
all we have lost.

My heart holds love and sorrow,
for Mother Earth; can find no ease,
until we make that evolutionary leap
from our long sleep:
see we are as endangered
as wild creatures, starving whales
and old growth trees -
and that to heal the earth
we alone hold all the keys.


for Sarah at Earthweal: who poses the challenge to become connected, not just with other humans, but with the whole ecosystem - such an inspiring leap, and  one we must make if we are to survive as a species.

Grief and Beauty During the Pandemic

My granddogs Cali and Chloe at Chestermans

In this time of the pandemic,
when so many are dying
and so many more are in denial,
rollicking on crowded beaches,
maskless, fearless, (until
the first symptoms appear)

In this time of the pandemic,
with a president spouting untruths
and vitriol, in a world gone mad
with ache and rage

I don't have to look far
to see the haloes, floating,
unseen, above the heads
of the nurses, the doctors,
the cleaning staff of our local hospital,
walking smilingly into sickrooms,
and helping.

They are as afraid of the virus as I,
maybe more afraid, for they have seen
all that covid can do, worked long
into the night to save a life
slipping away,
returned in the morning
to fight for one more day.

Unseen haloes hover above the heads
of the clerks at the CoOp, bagging our food;
shine above First Nations guardians,
turning away traffic at the gates
of their communities,
to keep their people safe.

One day we'll say "Remember
how it was during the pandemic,
when we all sheltered in place,
wore masks, stepped aside
to let each other pass,
when we followed the rules
to keep each other safe?"
It is a time of unnoticed heroics,
of courage, of hands held out,
of protecting the old
and the children.
It is a time when the bravest
walk into the fire,
to do what needs to be done,
while everyone else walks away.

We are watching the crazed world implode.
My heart overflows with
combined grief and beauty:
grief at the injustice, at all the dying,
the hatred and division, the racial slurs,
of so much that is so wrong;
yet also with hope, as people march in the streets
demanding change whose time has come.
How beautiful they are
with their Black Lives Matter and
Indigenous Lives Matter placards.
How strong, as they face the rows
of militarized police, row on row,
standing firm  with brave eyes,
haloes tilted rakishly above
the unexpected foot soldiers
of peace.

Meanwhile, in this crossroads of
left versus right,  justice versus might,
there is the beauty
of blue-green water with white-tipped waves
rolling endlessly into shore;
of happy, smiling dogs,
who know no pandemic,
who know nothing but love and joy,
their innocence, in the beauty
and the terror of this world,
bringing me to tears.

Inspired by The Pandemic Halo by Jime Moore, and Wild Writing with Laurie Wagner

On Sunday She Always Flies Out

On Sunday she always flies out

by Catrin Welz-Stein

source

On Sunday, she always flies out,
looking down on the green and
gold planet from above,
the metal-grey ocean,
porpoises and whales
leaping with joy and love,
a coastline of old growth forest
wrapping the shore like a glove.

On Sundays she always flies out,
seeking the far horizon, the great beyond.
She spirals and circles on the vortex
of air currents gentle and wild.
She is looking for somewhere to land
that is sweet and mild.

On Sundays she always flies out.
She wears her best dress and rides on
her favourite bird.
Before twilight falls, she hastens
to travel  back home.
She could find nowhere better,
which makes Sunday flying
feel slightly absurd.


Found this in drafts and decided to post it, since it is Sunday. Smiles.

Thirst

No matter how many glasses
she drank,
she never found
the happiness she sought
at the bottom of each one.

A thirst that
could not be quenched,
a need unfulfilled,
stalked her days.

"I had it all,"
she said on her deathbed.
I was glad she thought so,
but to me, her life
seemed hard and painful.

As a child, I feared
the glasses of liquid
they loved so much.
I feared the party atmosphere
with which each weekend
started out,
lay trembling during
the blows and crashes
and screams
towards midnight.

Next morning, I hated the smell
of stale booze and cigarettes,
and the way we sat silently
around the table
pretending the night before
had never happened.

for The Sunday Muse

Nothing Like a Good Fantasy

source

Scary Fairy Sherry breeches the holy vault

of the national legislature.

A hush falls as she swoops overhead

sprinkling magic dust on all the

rotund, beefy-cheeked, porky politicians.

They stop name-calling and squabbling about

more tax breaks for the rich,

and a "cost-of-living" increase in

their own gazillion dollar "extra benefits" package,

(to be financed by cuts in services to the poor) -

the only two items on the agenda.

They stop asking, "Mr Speaker,

will Someone please tell me, Mr Speaker,

when Mr (Scheer, Trudeau, Our Honourable Opponent)

will tell the Canadian people

what the fuddle-duddle

is going on?"

The roars of approbation 

and equally loud disgruntled booing

come to a full stop.

They all (for once united)

fix their beady eyes, 

jowls quivering in consternation,

on the round, green eco-warrior

at the podium.

The security guards are unsure of protocol.

They finger their holsters nervously

until she shoots them a look

and they desist.

You don't want to piss off

a person with magical powers.

Scary Fairy Sherry flutters

at the microphone.

"Ahem. This is to inform you

that the Women's Revolution

has begun.

In a moment, I will strike you

mute and motionless

long enough for the Women of the World

to get our housekeeping done.

We will sweep the armies off the landscape,

open the storage silos where food 

is uselessly warehoused,

and feed the hungry.

We will order all multinationals 

to pay their fair share of taxes,

clean up their mess,

and reduce all emissions to zero,

effective yesterday.

"We will begin programs all over the world,

to protect, nurture and restore

wildlife and ecosystems.

We will develop clean energy systems

all over Mother Earth,

to provide work and reverse the damage

oil-based energy has caused.

There will fricking be

No More Fracking.

We recognize you are addicted

to the oil energy model.

When you wake up

(to a clean green world)

we will send you all to treatment

for detoxing and rehabilitation.

Do not worry.

You will find out

there is another way to live.

"All of this rehabilitation of the earth

will employ every able body, for fair pay,

thus ending poverty and hopelessness

world-wide.

Every person will have a purpose,

and a means of sustaining him or herself

and their families.

We will enforce Sustainable Only use

of resources world-wide.

We will set up Task Forces everywhere

for restoration of the health 

of land and sea.

"Grandmothers will replace you

in positions of governance.

We will make decisions

based upon the well-being

of our children's children's children,

to the seventh generation. 

Decisions will be based on life and health,

not greed, money or power.

And you can bet your sweet patooties

we will not be sending 

our pink-cheeked boys
or dreamy-eyed girls

into the desert with guns.

Not gonna happen.

"So you can feel, deal and heal.

Or not.

We don't really care.

We have a lot of work to do,

cleaning up your mess.

Sweet dreams.

Nighty-night."

Scary Fairy Sherry waves her wand.

The porky politicians

topple over onto their desks

for a Hundred Year Snooze.

And the women of the world

get to work.

LOL. Don't I wish!!!!!! This is an old poem from 2015 for the open link at earthweal. I thought we could use some levity.......

The fuddle duddle comment harks back to when Pierre Trudeau (father of our current incumbent) famously said the F-word in legislature, and covered it up by saying he had uttered "Fuddle Duddle".