On Being Asked to Write a Poem Against the Destruction of the Natural World…

                             —One means of sanity is to retain a hold on the natural world, to remain, insofar as we can, good 
                                 animals. ~ Wallace Stegner

Well, yes I have written such poems on
occasion and several times in fact, not
because I was asked, but just because
my heart or soul or maybe some other
nameless part of me couldn’t help but
do so. I’ve quoted Rachel Carson, Walt
Whitman, and Wallace Stegner just to
add intellectual heft to my haranguing.
And based on what I can tell, so far none
of my writing or talking has made a single
bit of difference, except that I now stare
dumbstruck at the magnificence of a single
ocean wave, and cannot take my eyes
off clouds and full moons or Giant Egrets,
taking one tiny sacred step at a time.
After all, isn’t every poem ever just a search
and rescue party for our heart and soul–
nothing protected, nothing saved, nothing
sustained, except maybe, just maybe, me,
and you, and every other blessed thing.

All rights reserved. Posted with kind permission of the poet.

Photo by Jeremy Bishop

Dale Biron

Dale Biron is a poet, author, coach and adjunct professor at Dominican University OLLI Program. He is former poetry editor and board member for A Network For Grateful Living. His longtime friend and mentor, Brother David Steindl-Rast has long inspired Dale’s work with gratefulness and the power of grateful living. Dale has shared his poetry-inspired presentations at TEDx, The Herbst Theatre in San Francisco, as well as non-profit and business conferences nationwide. Dale is the author of a poetry collection entitled Why We Do Our Daily Practices. His latest work is a prose book entitled: Poetry For The Leader Inside You – A Search and Rescue Mission For The Heart and Soul. For more information, visit Dale’s Web Site. For more about Dale's on-demand eCourse, see:  A Fierce and Enduring Gratitude: How Poetry Supports Us in Good Times and Bad

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