an abecedarian
by Cecile Earle
 |
| AI-generated graphic by NightCafé for The New Verse News. |
A grasshopper chirping and clicking his legs
by the flower pot, sees me, sits up, rolls his eyes,
“Come on,” he says to me, “A
dictatorship is coalescing.
Even I know—Let’s call it what it is:
Fascism. Has a stun gun turned you into statues?
Gather your forces,” he says, “Come on
humans! All of you—Yes, you too, Cecile. Now!
In this moment! Wake up!
Jump on it! Now! You teeter! You
know nations can explode in a flash!
Listen! All I see you doing is waving arms,
making gestures, filing papers. And still,
nothing is coming together as this
oligarchy solidifies like a glacier. And you?
Puzzled. Positing solutions. Talk. Talk. Stuck in glue.
Questioning as you chatter, chatter.
Rally now.
Stop them.
Time’s up! Don’t
use now to
veer on the side of caution!
Wake up! Democracy! Ours! Don’t let
X and his minions rule our world!
You can do it,” the grasshopper says, as he
zips into the garden. Waves. “See you tomorrow.”
Cecile Earle taught English at UCB and Bay Area Colleges. She also focused on Latin American affairs and social justice as editor with the Center for the Study of the Americas in Berkeley. She has published poetry, essays, memoir, and short fiction, and she has won awards for writing on immigration, nomadic migrations in Northern Kenya, and climate change with, among others, Soul Making Keats of the National League of American Pen Women, Bay Area Poet’s Coalition, Word Peace, and the Mendocino Writer’s Conference.
