by Pepper Trail
Iceland reports the presence of mosquitoes for the first time, as climate warms —NPR, October 22, 2026
The ice is going, the ice of Iceland
Gone are the herring and the codfish
What we harvest now are tourists, so many
They fill the high tower of the Hallgrímskirkja
They fill the restaurants, avid for puffin and whale
For bits of fermented shark, all those bygone tastes
And following them, now the mosquitoes have come
Carried north on the world’s sickly southern breath
Bringing us a different misery than those we loved
Thirsting for a taste of our unmoved Nordic blood
Yet still, we are given our island’s dark comedy
The earth opening and closing beneath our feet
And above, through our unbroken nights
Wavering curtains of unearthly light
Pepper Trail is a poet and naturalist based in Ashland, Oregon. His poetry has appeared in Rattle, Atlanta Review, Spillway, Kyoto Journal, Cascadia Review, and other publications, and has been nominated for Pushcart and Best of the Net awards. His collection Cascade-Siskiyou was a finalist for the 2016 Oregon Book Award in Poetry.
