An Ode to Mauna Loa

An Ode to Mauna Loa: Breaking together with the living One

At 421.21 ppm
Feedback screams its piercing sound
Rising rates after lockdown
We’re falling down
the Long Mountain of Life

We’ll turn away no more
As the breaking of Life
returns to our threshold.

What was pretended now breaks apart
Both in us and around
We’re breaking together with the living One.

You don’t escape this. I don’t.
No part will not break together
With each of us
And every us
Within the living One.

Is poetry what I’ve come to?
Let’s drop the ambiguity
We’re fucked
I’m scared.
Let’s pray.

But I’m no longer Praying for Time
Coz there is infinity inside
In you
and me
and anyone despised.

For in the beginning
All was pre-forgiven.
Gaia so loved her kids she got us to break together, not apart
With Her
At 421.21 ppm
There is no tougher love

But there is life after doom
And life beyond fucked
Because Life is always astounding
In this one moment
And the next
It’s just that being slapped awake
Doesn’t really feel that great.
But could it ever?

Written on April 6th 2021 after reading about the measurements of C02 at the Mauna Loa observatory going through 420ppm for the first time on April 3rd, and then witnessing some scientists quibble about how someone tweeted it without enough reassuring context (thereby ignoring this increase happens after a year that saw significant temporary emissions reductions from human activity). See my other poems here.