Poem

As I was going through more of the memorabilia I unpacked, I came across this poem I wrote a few years ago:

Nature, you overstated metaphor,
You present your garrish self with such arrogance,
Smug and confident in your ability to please your audience.
Humanity gasps at your theatrics.

Your puffy clouds in a blue, blue sky,
Fog lifting off a river,
Ooh! Ahh!
Add a shaft of light and we think we see God.

Blurt out your gawdy Autumn statement.
Fill our vision with razzle-dazzle.
Show us red, orange, and yellow.
Watch us feel small and thrill to that smallness.

Throw your water on a beach, smash it agasinst your rocks.
Plant a flower in the desert, blow a breeze across the plains.
We are so easily delighted.
Terrorize us with your storms and watch us cringe in awe of you.

Spit on us with your snow and see us turn our faces upward.
Put sun on that same snow,
Cast your shadows, you blatant clown,
And watch us leap and cavort with pleasure.

Twinkle your stars, eclipse your moon.
See us dance to the sight of it.
Make us marvel at a colored bird,
Move us to tears with your sunsets.

We bite the apple every time we look at you,
Grabbing the nearest fig leaf to cover our shame.
We apologize for our own existence,
Scurry to cover our tracks, bury our waste.

Nature, you miserable, sadistic puppet-master,
You deny us the ignorance of self-consciousness.
You separate us from the rest, or so we believe,
And we provide the comic relief.