Not Poetry. Quatrain Verse in English & Swedish. Dagsverser. On the Mundane & the Arcane.
Erstwhile kids, now grownups
galloping wildly
standing in own stirrups
Long now since childly
Ought not be arcane
let them be who they are
So give them free rein
and the chance to go far
Do free them, or would you rather
that they turn out like their father?
We ignore stentorian warning:
Planetary life keeps crumbling
in depletion, pollution, warming
met by our evasive mumbling
We equivocate & grumble
just own convenience is heeded
Glaciers melt & earthquakes rumble
not taking steps urgently needed
Our children & theirs shall pay the price
if we won’t change habits, they’re doomed:
As rivers drain, temperatures rise
ending them too early entombed
But for us, for now, a small price to pay
for enjoying the American Way?
Planet now gasps polluted
choked by foul breathing fossil fuel
Cannot be restituted
so who are we trying to fool?
If unshackling from what we’re doing
still leaves Earth drained, parched & heated
there cannot be any undoing
how our children have been cheated!
Even if we’d no longer deplete
and agreed upon zero growth
can we put an end to our conceit
& break away from under sloth?
Maybe try out frugality
which does have a winsome knack
instead of the banality
letting shopping have our back?
Better live forgoing
than perish elbowing
Now leaps, sleep gotten shallow
pinched in vised senescence
While children sweetly callow
express their quintessence:
with the jounciest leap
as well the deepest sleep
Global warming
A bike dealer who mentions global warming may indeed be guilty of the same self serving cheap promotion as the car dealership, which flies an over sized American flag or the politician who presumes to speak for ‘all hardworking folks’.
Be this as it may, the earth is “on the verge of disastrous climate changes that spiral dynamically out of humanity’s control, causing mass extinction, ecosystem collapse and dramatic sea level rises.”
James Hansen, the chief climate scientist at NASA, returned to Capitol Hill in June, on the twentieth anniversary of his 1988 testimony, to indeed warn that the earth is on the verge of “disastrous climate changes that spiral dynamically out of humanity’s control,” causing “mass extinction, ecosystem collapse and dramatic sea level rises.”
Obviously no amount of bicycling shall reverse or by itself significantly slow the spiraling.
Nothing shall. Short of perhaps radical life style changes right now, which clearly ain’t happening.
But for all its horror I’d personally rather know than living in denial of my own betrayal of future generations. Being only one of some 7 billions humans cannot lessen my complicity. I have sadly done nothing beyond mildly inconveniencing myself regarding arguably the greatest calamity that can possibly face life on planet Earth.
Strolling, of their kids inattentive
parents seen glued to their smart phones
Swept by insidious incentive
they’re performing, tech-prompted clones
Involuntarily
whether dad or mom
acting out squirrelly
to calm any qualm?
while unseen kids glaring glum
pining for an heedful crumb
The child’s mind is clearness
in unspoken dearness
in unbroken nearness
each moment as hereness
In the present time fulfilled
absent of pretension
mind by the most minute stilled
free from condescension
All in wonder of the mundane
in wide starry eyes ponder
not drawn to lofty or arcane
not off somewhere there yonder
Duck is a duck, no swan
no airs needing put on
Baby Anton Oct 2013 in his stroller with Eric leaning over
Anton, aged one, seated in his elaborate stroller and Eric, his old neighbor & ground crew, meet for a morning chat, while Anton reflects:
Mom, Mom watch, watch me, Mom
handsome, unruffled.
Staying serenely calm
by binky muffled.
Mom, Mom watch, watch me, Mom
in my spacecraft seat.
With greatest of aplomb
hovering off street.
So cool by console, at controls
by all adult doubt unfazed.
Topping the baby pilot polls
my many enemies dazed.
But it can’t be a breeze
for my poor ground crew.
Eric leaning in askew
on his aging knees?
We’re two gregarious chaps
who banter when we meet
sporting similar slick caps:
The neighborhood elite.
(p.s. Mom:)
Admirers all keep rushing
squeaky voices gushing.
How do I avoid blushing?
Celeb’s role bit crushing.
We’re told that granddaughter Ellie, on a NYC field trip, craved tasting a ‘real’ bagel. While waiting in line (snaking half-around-the-block) to Katz’s Deli she ‘elliequently’ burst out: “Is this place any good?”
“Did she sweetly get nervous
fearing that the long wait
was just due to slow service
not bagels being great?”
The other year Ellie visited the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem, and is said to have made this ‘ellitist’ remark:
“Well, it’s wholly holy
but of modest scale
in height rising lowly
but go ahead: wail!
So that’s all:
an old wall?”
On the same NYC trip as when Ellie snaked around Katz’s she also visited Wall Street, and perhaps congruently she reflected:
“Be it where they scam & cheat
where displaying grim gall:
Just another city street
lacking parking. That’s all!”
She’s the Katz’s meow!
O Bella, ciao!
What idiotic presumption
that what’s for us a smooth road
of endless growth and consumption
somehow doesn’t deplete the lode!
Humans been binging
until all got unhinged
Still we ain’t cringing
our cheeks by shame untinged
We have been undiscerning
so for our hapless brood
their future now adjourning:
Irreversibly screwed