Printed as submitted
For so long humans have behaved as if we were in charge.
For so long we have forgotten our place, at the top of the food chain, how dependent we are on the gifts of Earth. For food, water, breath, beauty, joy.
We have taken and taken, disrupting Earth’s cycles, cycles that ensure clean water, air, and soil.
We have forgotten to listen to Earth, to abide by Her wisdom.
To treat Her as the Mother She is.
To honor Her gifts.
And to reciprocate. Reciprocate. Reciprocate.
To meet these challenges/opportunities, (food and shelter security, pollution of our land, waters, and air) we must restore community, become servants again, not masters. We must restore a viable relationship with Earth.
Must recognize all Earth’s people who fly and crawl and swim.
People, no more or less than a sound through which creation expresses, bound into mineral of rock or flesh of form. People bound into a family held together in this house called Earth.
As my neighbor puts it: “It’s wonderful to have family, if you can all get along. That’s the first test in life, I guess. Otherwise, it’s perpetual war.”
This time, this comeuppance, provides an opportunity to support a vision that honors Earth and our siblings, by farming responsibly, as Kerry is now doing at the Farm on PCH and Heathercliff. Her vision extends to creating a center where people can gather in small numbers, no more than 20, to exchange wisdom, encouragement, stories and poetry. To nourish community and further our understanding of each other and how to live responsibly.
The Farm has long held this vision. When Allan Cunningham held it, he welcomed Poetry Potluck. Local poets gathered around the vegetables and shared their poems. When it became too cold, because there was no inside option available at the Farm, we moved to the home of Ellen Reich, our second poet laureate. That gathering continues, on zoom, to this day. That is only one example of the lasting effect such gatherings have.
When Kerry assumed leadership of the Farm, she also supported this vision. Poets and storytellers have continued to perform there, plein air. Kerry is providing desperately needed solutions to these times. Solutions that thrive community. Solutions that must be supported.
Al of us, including the City, must invest in building a community center at the Farm. Invest in creating a place that nourishes a community seeking to learn, to reciprocate.
Ann Buxie