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“Lara walked along the tracks following a path worn by pilgrims and then turned into the fields. Here she stopped and, closing her eyes, took a deep breath of the flower-scented air of the broad expanse around her. It was dearer to her than her kin, better than a lover, wiser than a book. 

For a moment she rediscovered the purpose of her life. She was here on earth to grasp the meaning of its wild enchantment and to call each thing by its right name, or, if this were not within her power, to give birth out of love for life to successors who would do it in her place.”

- Boris Pasternak

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She was here on Earth,

for now

to nurture
a lone patch of milkweed
for the last monarch butterflies looking to land from the fiery skies

to make sure that some stalks of aster and goldenrod
remain, entangled and kissing
on the day this most brutal World dies

to sweep an old concrete slab every day until
blue snakes shed their final skins

to let the crows drink from her mouth
a last sip from the great lake,

known as michigan //

and to keep some seeds

sweetgrass, corn,
melon, chile, squash
pawpaw, cedar, oak,
maple, blackberry, datura, bean

in a jar, made from micaceous clay

---

---

sparkling, and sealed with her blood-made mud

for when inevitably arrives that day,

then, she’ll clasp it in her wrinkled spotted hand

and bury herself along with it, deep within this land,

so the Earth, right here,

might, one day,

become home for life, once again.