"The Long Emergency" Emergency Response Team

There will come a day
when oranges
in Christmas stockings
will be a treat;
when Christmas will mean
Solstice.

when things that won’t grow here
won’t be on the table here;
when sorghum won’t be
only the stuff of festivals;

when a late frost won’t
irritate, but kill.

A time will come
when WE will be the Indians,
natives on the land,
poisoned again;
but now strangers to it,
poisoned by it, and
cursing the greedof fattened fools cool
in their tombs.

A time will come
when we again measure day
by the sun;
when the turning
of Orion spells the turning
of the earth;
when the first
sweet fruit is the pungent bite
of radish; sharp tang of Ramp;
when child’s play
is work,
and work the study
of life,
and life the measured study
of earth.


- Bob Kijcaid, 2005
(the author retains the copyright)