Carbon to Community
I thought it was about carbon emissions
I thought it was about asking permission
From the Government, Corporations
Please will you change your labels?
Please will you do what’s right
So that we don’t have to fight
For the truth?
The truth
Everything so convoluted, by those men in suits
Everything so mish mash, I’ve got whiplash
Everyone’s in cahoots
Everything’s so crazy we can’t even eat the fruits
Off of our own trees
Trees that God put there, for you and for me
Trees that provide shade and the air that we breathe
Trees that provide firewood
And suck the carbon
We don’t need
Carbon
Oh what weight that word doth harbour
The facts and the figures, why yes it’s important
But all that arguing and all that talk
Was yet another mirage
That hid the problem at large
I thought we could go slowly, at our own pace
Picking and choosing what we want to replace
Plastic for paper, dairy for oat
Meatless Mondays, whatever floats our boat
But the answers do not lie in upholding the systems
In simply making small changes to reduce our emissions
The answers lie in finding our roots
In being in cahoots with ourselves, with community
In finding strength in our unity
In looking at plants and seeing their beauty
In thanking the trees for doing their duty
In singing and dancing
Humming and strumming
Learning and playing
Laughing and straying
Off the beaten path, into the blue
Living in uncertainty, discovering the new
Living in discomfort, squirming and struggling
To find our wings
Like a caterpillar in a cocoon
Or a flower about to bloom
Humans are nature, we follow a sequence
We follow a cycle, we thrum to a beat
If not, we get stuck and things start to get tricky
We start to feel stressed and sad and icky
We start to forget we knew the answers all along
We can find them written into ceremony and song
To find our roots
We must take off our boots
The answers are found
By putting bare feet on the ground
By hugging the trees and studying the ants
By admiring the leaves and how the bees dance
The answers are found by slowing down
In looking up at the stars when we feel a frown
In a warm embrace
In holding space
In connecting to place
Instead of this rat race
No, it’s not about the carbon emissions
It’s about giving ourselves permission
To return to the earth
To return to hearth
To cry, to make art
And to live from the heart