mosquitoes hover
over my mosquito chair,
there is the scent of something fresh in the air,
the freshness of a distant mountain
whose ridge is like the profile of a sleeping damsel,
the freshness of being above most trees
yet sitting on a man-made porch,
as if being on this porch was proof
that man could rise above nature,
or at least
its lesser maples and oaks.
i read of genocide today
in a place that is too familiar.
the victims were denied the luxury
of faces and names, there was no spectacle
to their hacked-up corpses left to rot
in the middle of an impossible desert.
the attackers were one of many possible militias,
which, not coincidentally, rhymes with malicious.
the day i really decided to teach, my heart hurt.
i want those kids to see polar bears in the wild,
discover a panamanian golden frog hugging a jungle vine,
be able to see healthy bat populations mating with the right cave.
i want them to know the rainbow serenity of a healthy reef,
be able to tread confidently in a place as low as amsterdam.
the mosquitoes hover
over my mosquito chair:
and i would not dare
to stop them from biting me.
