Last night
I sat up trembling,
awake in the darkest hours of the night
As a carnival of shadows danced against the walls
As if a canvas of malody

Wondering

When in our history as a people
Did we become impregnated
with the toxic idea
That this earth
is something which belongs to us

Our rivers bottled in plastic
Striped of their essential minerals
Sold back to us for a high price

Food producing plants
scientifically modified
In order to not produce seed
So local farmers
have to go to Monsanto
To buy their lives back

Oil drills stuck into mothers
soiled belly like syringes
Exracting ancient ancestral plant life
Archived in sediment and stone
In order to fuel our cars
Carved from the center of mountains

They would sell us the very air we breath
If they could find a way to contain the wind

We who have been brainwashed to believe
scientists who claim the moon
to be a dead rock
An open space to colonize with a wind filled flag

We have carved out
the bark  layered bellies
of so many thousands of trees
to construct our homes
out of a body of wilderness
Weve forgetton in our development
we now live in an altered forest

We are ravaging this world as if it were not our home
The place we lay our heads to sleep and wake to live
The ground upon which we raise our kids

This earth
who speaks
who grows
who is as we are
In a constant cycle of change

This earth
whose name is the compilation
of all who sing upon her back

She who nourishes our medicine
Who is fertile womb of dormancy
who is giving birth as we speak
You can hear her labor pains
in the thunders under her peaks

She is strong and resilient and beautiful
With forests for lungs
snake like rivers for tongues
And mountains whose ancient bellys
beat like drums

Her streams are dreams of salmon
Her hillsides are buffolo and deer
She is multilayered
and spinning in orbit around a huge bonfire

lit by a lunar grandmother moon
at night its light pulls her tides
orchestrating the cycles of our womens wombs

Her skin is composed of
caves and canyons
ravines and valleys
Which are wrinkled stories upon her chiseled cheeks
And we are blessed to feel her body like brail each time we walk with our bare feet

Elder
Grandmother
earth
we are your children
singing you our songs
Reciting you our poems
Dancing you our dances
Painting  you our portraits

In hopes of recognizing you who birthed our movement
Who tightened our vocal chords
who carved our pencils
Who shaped our feet,
who sprouted our seeds in this symphony
Called life.

We are gradually re-membering
Our dismembered consciousness
Are placing our humble words
Like flowers upon the wind

We who are still children
still drawn towards collecting things
Are here in this raging river
Attempting to keep our heads above water

Asking for your guidance
In re-calling you
back into the webs
of our awakening dreams.