by Cheryl Perreault, from the chapbook Refuge:

How Earth Offers Refuge and Remedy in the Year of Global Pandemic

This walk-about through forests and fields
Surrounding the gardens of these farmlands
In the midst of summer and this global pandemic,
I listen and look for instructions. I wander all around
Upon Earth’s omniscient waiting, pulsating ground.
Two carcasses of moles below, show off their dark, gray fur
Inviting convergence with my own two paused-in-place feet.
See their tiny, pink fingers rise skyward like mine to the sun.
See these remnant feathers of hawk with wide open wings
That flew to its own wild song. Now they are my wings too.
Notice soon-coming elderberries, raspberries, blueberries,
Some for people, some for the deer, enough for everyone.
Do not touch the nettles, how deeply they can sting.
Instead I become the nettles and examine thorns of me.
Yet nettles and comfrey plants give alchemy of tea, so drink.
And milkweed’s medicinal milk is sustainer of breath and lungs,
Rub into a ball and smoke it. Breathe in world sickness in unison.
Breathe out universal mother-love, feel every heart beat as one.
All this shapeshifting of life. All this miracle of growth
That causes scientists and sapiens to still wonder How? and Why?
Maybe the answer is in these forests and farms and fields
showing how we can truly heal the garden of this whole world,
Earth offers in reply.

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