"Our First Mother"

Ellie Brooks 

The Earth is still alive
though we all exist on different planes

I hope it’s not an exclusive club
experiencing nature this way

the geese in the distance
the fish in the water

my breath lept
when one jumped out to catch a bug
sending ripples through my silence

I look to my bike under the moonlight
during 3am rides in the chill of a September night

I feel connected to other poets
the crazies of this world who cannot sleep

and are not trapped by their anxieties when
they roam free in the landscape they belong

not conceiving of their own minds’ universes but
honing in and connecting
they’re learning how to tell the tales
of this world around us

Earth, she told me something last night

has she ever told you of her moonlight starry night
and all who dance underneath it

the steam rising from the water
to float to the tune of flickering bugs in the brush

am I a part of this
with my 2 wheeled metal motion extension

driving by in the night
the cars seem so invasive
though their engines roar
with merely mechanical might

I would jump if a snake crawled up beside me

even now I sit on shifted stone as if to remind
how I do not quite belong, anymore, in the grass

I find no comfort in the fellow passerbys
they invade the intimacy of such a place
though we share our species
I am most likely an intruder, like them, all the same

But mother nature didn’t knit her riverbends
solely for my lonesome encounters

Her bounty is plentiful
and there for every straggler to seek

the wanderlust we feel is the call within us
to allow earth to discover herself

but we’ve forgotten how to love her
and take for ourselves instead

perhaps it is time to think
and no longer blindly borrow from our Mother

because she will have the final say
on the timing of our last tomorrow

for when she bends she breaks
and if she breaks she grows stronger

she gave birth to the land we walk on this way
we cannot forget Her

if we are to go on.

Because the Earth is still alive
and will be once we’ve gone.

_________________________________________________________________________

My name is Ellie, I'm a writer based in Upstate NY. I love spending my days walking quietly through the woods or sneaking up on waterfalls. Currently, I'm saving up and planning for a walk across the United States on the American Discovery Trail. 

Instagram: @tetheredweather