“We just need to wake people up!”
No, I’m sad to say we’ve been awake for a long time.
We’ve been watching for a long time as she slipped away
between row houses and street signs announcing Sagebrush,
Poplar, Clearwater, Skyline— postage stamp reminders
like pins on a map or footprints in the brush,
so someone someday would know she once was,
and in which direction she went (anywhere she could—
anywhere we left spaces that we learned to visit only
in secrecy and sanctity, becoming magical,
being magical for as long as we could).
We fought, we clawed, we begged man and god,
and we watched fully awake as she disappeared before our eyes.
No, there is no sleeping in this epoch between wildness
and encapsulation. The sirens and blinking lights
are beacons in the night; we pace— caged animals
pulled by a moon we cannot see but feel nonetheless,
our footsteps leaving grooves in the carpet
so someone someday will know how much we prayed.
Jess Lee
JESS LEEis an environmental & community advocate drawn to borders, ecotones, and the shadows between the lines. She was raised in the forests of Appalachia and lived for many years in Mexico, Hawaii and the Pacific Northwest. Her short stories and essays have been published in Cutthroat, Burnt Pine, The Humanist and Z Magazine.
Wow! Ralph Waldo Emerson of our time!