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Gray Wolf
I have a silver-furred clan.
Grandmas and nephews
and cousins twice removed.
We keep each other in line
and we survive
here in the cold reaches of Canada
down to Minnesota.
We raise pups and talk,
howl and roam,
and when I twitch my eyebrow
at what I hear you say,
why, my heart is reverberating
in a wild dance with your soul.
Annelinde Metzner
June 1992 "Voices of Gaia"
Key Deer
I am a solitary being
even among my own kind.
I step with caution from the mangroves
and the hardwood hammocks,
expecting the open meadow,
finding instead the fast machines on asphalt
who run us down so heedlessly.
I step carefully and alone
through silver palms and mulberry
observing without comment
the passage of time.
Annelinde Metzner
June 1992 "Voices of Gaia"
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| Prairie smoke |
Prairie Smoke
Flower of the grasslands
unfurling pink plumes
in dry, inch-thin soil.
Geum triflorum.
The wind blows gently through my sweet feathers.
Shamaness, mistress of illusion, shape shifter.
I grow in soil but cast a spell of mist,
drift like smoke.
Now you see me, now you don’t.
I’m never where you expect me to be.
I may grow into your consciousness when you least expect it,
misty flower of the grasslands.
Annelinde Metzner
"Voices of Gaia" 1992
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| Field of prairie smoke |
 |
| Karner Blue butterfly |
Butterfly
On the Midwest prairie
the bright-spotted Regal Fritillary
dines on a banquet of violets.
Wild lupines feed the Karner Blue
next to a runway at the Saratoga Airport.
Bay Area elfins will lay eggs
only when the sun is bright and the air calm,
succulent sedum nearby.
Yes, we are regal, the Butterfly Queens.
We richly deserve your admiration.
We are finicky and difficult.
We require a wild garden paradise.
You may keep your dull sameness
and live without us.
Annelinde Metzner
"Voices of Gaia" 1992
 |
| Regal Fritillary |
Here are two more from my collection of poems in the voices of endangered species, called "Voice of Gaia" of 1992.
