Easter is a time of reflection on man’s relationship to God. It should also be a time of reflection on man’s relationship to nature …and our changing climate. The news from Antarctica is not good. In fact, it is terrifying.
I asked my friend and neighbor, Gus Speth, if I could use one of his poems this Easter as complement to the news from Antarctica. A Rhodes Scholar and clerk for legendary Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black, Gus is a lifelong champion of the environment. He was Jimmy Carter’s Chair of the Council on Environmental Quality in the White House, founder of the Natural Resources Defense Council and World Resources Institute, Dean of the Yale School of Environmental Studies, and Administrator of the United Nations Development Programme, who is often referred to as the third most senior official within the UN System, after the political appointees (Secretary General and Deputy Secretary). Gus is the author of many books of law, policy and the environment. In his retirement he has taken to poetry (publishing 5 volumes) to convey his reflections of 60+ years of public service and pleas to all of us to celebrate and care for our planet.
Happy Easter!
Bread and Roses [by Gus Speth]
When the big sea has stopped rising
and the maps we’re through revising
and I can think of storms as friends,
I’ll go down to the beach again.
I’ll stand still there in that bright surf
and sing a song to this dear Earth.
I’ll sing for climate change to end.
I’ll sing tears for where we have been.
I’ll sing to things that we have learned –
the fossils we should not have burned
releasing the power of former suns,
bringing losses that cannot be undone.
Sad losses the children will inherit.
Species gone without much credit,
thanks to the piles of money earned
and all the corners left unturned.
I’ll sing to anger rising still.
Our leaders let firms do their will.
The people did assert control
but not before the barons stole.
Our job is now to make the best,
finding purpose in what is left.
It is a joy to live to fight
and on that beach to fly two kites.
