. . . A natural year in an unnatural world

when i consider what’s happening to our planet
i’m left mostly powerless: what the hell can i do?
CARL SAFINA TAKES ANOTHER TACK

the one that runs right under his nose
to begin with it aint the whole planet that tugs at me
what’s going on right here?

lazy point, long island

right here happens to be just this side of a sand dune
on long island’s north shore close to its remote tip
what he sees there is a world of life & change

and from that windswept hermitage he takes it all in
month by month, truth by truth
little chance for what the rest of us call reality

the man knows his wildlife friends, how they’re called
where they’re coming from, where headed
season by season, migration by migration

tapestry of movement & struggle
gurgling seabrook, moody skysong, life as lived
as only cousins on the wing can tell it

seen this close up, yes mother earth’s pure poem
carl’s writing does the moment justice throughout
listen . . .

Fishing in a place is a meditation on the rhythm of a tide, a season, the arc of a year, and the seasons of a life. The more repetitive, the better, because the experience is like a wheel that – by going around and around as though doing the same thing – continually covers new ground, bringing you to a very different place.  (p 112)

if those meditations of the life pulsing around him were all he wrote
those alone would make reading THE VIEW worth the reflection
but that peace & clarity bring him much farther

we stand to lose it all . . .

When it would have mattered, no one ever said, “Thou shall not pollute.” Now that it’s an issue, our wisdom traditions, and our economic system, lack adequate moral language to address it and the ethical consensus to deal with it. And because we’re not really in control of the vehicle we’re driving, the world is entering a truly new time.”  (p 79)

my ipad’s colored yellow w/ carl’s lessons to be learned
so again, if those lessons were all he wrote
those would make the book definitely worth the reading

in the end carl’s book is nothing less than spiritual revelation
his long windup to the final page bringing such tears of recognition
i had to run next door, read it fresh to adele

here is life pulsing at its most authentic & cosmic
the way the most gifted if not outright holiest of our mystics see it
the way teillard de chardin saw it himself  ( PHENOMENON OF MAN )

listen again . . .

We are self-assembled stardust aware of the universe and the future. Energy that had been headed across the eternal, infinite vacuum of space is at this moment running the thought machine that is the breathing you. We are one knot in a great web of being, building out of the vast past and ( with luck ) continuing billions of years into the future, until the sun dies, the last of its energy reaches Earth, and our local light goes out. The most appropriate response to the world is to realize, with awe, the ferocious mystery of being alive in it. And act accordingly. The worst thing anyone should be able to say about their life is also the greatest thing anyone can say: “I tried my best”.  (p  358)

lazy point long island / photo by mira alamy / national geographic traveler