Kiss My Grass

Low but distinct rumblings of grass

are felt

'Meadow indignation' mixed with disdain

at concentrate-levels

an elder might detect

in a petulant unapologetic child

Age and a lifetime of experience

versus

Impatient dependence with belief in being the center on which earth spins

Low green blades grow

sans any need to exercise defiance

Existence before you

Existence after you

"I will grow over your decaying bones"

Sensory receptors only half open

as mortals studied it

Classified and categorized it

Then dug it up for gravel paths

Sidewalks

Nature trails—a spit in the face

Like nature needed stupid help

Or rolled over and sacrificed life

for madness that knows no end

#JusticeforOchanya#

For millennia over millennia

mammals trod with blessed feet

Gazed or grazed promise of life

in perennial simplicity

Mother Earth’s closest-fitting chlorophyll garment

Vibrant verdant-ness

ripped in places

where it never ceded permission

and wondering

where the gentle

and respectful ones went

while it remains anchor-green-clasped calm

defying calculation

Low but distinct rumblings

against fixation on control

Emission poisons

toward a species

that could not make it grow

if it refused

And curses foul

against creatures who possess a hunger

never sated.

Author's Note:-

Mid-morning bike ride.

A different route through a quiet residential area. You know the type. Manicured with not a thing out of place. Like planet Camazotz in the novel “A Wrinkle In Time” where everyone moves the same at precisely the same moment.

I pedalled past cars without a speck of dirt parked in almost every driveway. Picture windows showing new furniture and wall art.

More building developments to come.

The never-ending residential construction sucking up land left, right, and center in ferocious sameness.

Gravelled trails, roads, and sidewalks through the grass.

A low but distinct vibration rumbling,

The absurdity of the scene hit full force, and I heard the grass spout its exasperation.

Disgust.

Fury.

I knew, I’d go into research mode once back at home.

It turns out that not only does grass produce oxygen and absorb carbon dioxide, it prevents soil erosion. Grass is natural habitat for flora and fauna, one of many reasons making it the foundation plant of our ecosystem and life itself. It has noise reduction properties in urban areas, traps dust and helps to cool the environment, all while being a sponge for rainwater.

Regular flooding yet chucking aside the help.

Sensible.

Green Leaf Volatiles (GLVs) are released from grass when it is under stress. So that freshly cut grass smell is actually the plant’s distress signal and a warning.

With extreme events like flooding, global warming, air pollution on a trajectory continuum, can we afford to be nonchalant about one of our most enduring allies in this fight?