The Bird and the Bee
by Jonel Abellanosa / January 26th, 2020
It appears along the way, the question.
Walking exposes my skepticism.
Exercising curiosity, I recognize
the scarcity of butterflies in my adult life,
wonder if air has thickened,
heavy with invisible weights.
Should I pull and push the wave
that steadies the heart? I might one day
set bushes in my lungs afire, streams
through nostrils with molecular accelerants.
Storms out of season, acidic seas,
shrinking arctic ice, plastics killing
more whales than stupid traditions
and greed. Vengeance of volcanoes.
How do we explain long after we’re gone?
How do the future’s children understand?
Greed grays my mind’s clouds,
my anger crude as oil. Chances of our
planet’s survival black as coal.
A bird that isn’t a bird tears the sky
on whim like the Paris Agreement.
If it isn’t tweetstorming, it is
unthinking the war machine
as its sex slave.
Jonel Abellanosa lives in Cebu City, The Philippines. His poetry and fiction are forthcoming in The Cape Rock, Woodcrest Magazine and Poetry Salzburg Review, and have appeared in hundreds of magazines and anthologies, including Dissident Voice, New Verse News, Chiron Review, Invisible City, The Lyric, The McNeese Review, and The Anglican Theological Review. His poetry collections include, “Songs from My Mind’s Tree” and “Multiverse” (Clare Songbirds Publishing House, New York), “50 Acrostic Poems,” (Cyberwit, India), “In the Donald’s Time” (Poetic Justice Books and Art, Florida), and “Pan’s Saxophone” (Weasel Press, Texas). He is a nature and animal lover, especially dogs and has with three companion dogs.
Read other articles by Jonel.
This article was posted on Sunday, January 26th, 2020 at 8:02am and is filed under Poetry.
