August 20, 2026

i’m
always
overwhelmed

because i keep
breaking everything down
into smaller and smaller pieces

you’d think this would help

it hurts

because i keep all the pieces inside my perception
the whole and the parts
and the parts feel
so many…

for example:
i follow the backwards projection
of everything everything everything to try to
negate my own impact
on the world

i know fast fashion
is terrible for the environment
so i err towards slow fashion
i err towards second-hand
but both of these have impacts
money spent in the fashion industry
and the possibility that it won’t fit well
it will wear out
eventually
and i’ll have to make a decision
whether or not
to throw it
out

so i err towards making my own clothing
but there are still impacts:
fabric to buy
[if i know the person who makes my clothes
is working too hard
for too little pay — that still stays
when talking about who is making
the fabric when i make
my own clothing, correct?]
and all the notions
and thread
and little things
i’m still paying
into the economy — what if i want to be
completely self-sustaining?

so then we look at visible mending
the clothes i already have
with the supplies i already have
which is quite a bit
but i’m still forever getting little things:
sashiko patterns
and replacing certain embroidery thread
i know i’ll use
and darning tools
and i just want to
not
buy
anything
at
all

and on and on and on
and backwards and backwards and backwards
and when is something too warn out to wear
and how many rags can you really have
before it’s just an excuse to keep
tiny
tiny
tiny
things
everywhere everywhere everywhere around the house

i’m not explaining myself very well
but it is a thing i think about
every
single
day

August 8, 2026

leave it to a thunderstorm
rumbling in my bones
as my eyes watch the trees
sway and toss and turn in the intense breeze
to actually get my brain and body and heart to acknowledge
a love for being alive
on this Earth

it feels too emotional
too sincere
to share in any way but poetry
but even the words of poetry feel too simple
for the intensity of the feeling
or too flowery to really embody
the groundedness of the feeling
[though flowers are grounded too, in their growing, are they not?]

how can i explain the feeling of ‘home’
that is this living within all Earth has to offer?
i love her i love her i love her
and maybe that’s the heightened emotions talking
and maybe that’s my experience with many personifications happening
and maybe there’s a distance and a pushing that comes from
writing this hours and hours and after the experience
but my heart feels to bursting with love of this planet
and yet, i know my heart will not explode,
for everything has worked itself out over billions of years
for hearts to not literally engorge with emotion,
but the feelings align with physical signs
my heart seems to fill, to push up at my throat
as that signals to my eyes to fill with tears
just as they did last night
during the thunder and lighting and rain and realization
that i actually
at that moment
and this
love being
alive

and i have the Earth to thank

August 1, 2026

the coyotes howl
and yip
and screech a bit
and there’s definitely more than three or four of them
and i’ve never experienced coyotes in a group, the
extent of my wild sighting(s) was
mangy
sick
solitary
scrounging around
barely alive
barely surviving
i thought the first one was a
sickly domesticated dog, until i described it to my dad
and he said
“coyote.
definitely.”

but these seemed wild and vital and collective
and though we howled back
[probably stupidly, as humans do]
we just wanted to hear them
again and again and again
for it was something few of us had ever experienced before
and might never again
and i hope nature is healing in ways
we might not be able to even see, because we are observing
[almost]
every
single
way
we’re fucking it up,
and having hope would be
fucking fantastic for my mental health
and for the physical health of
literally every living being on the planet
and the planet itself
so i hope for hope
which, definitionally is a hope itself
and in this moment it was sparked by the first wild howl
of a family of coyotes
i have ever
ever
ever heard

July 18, 2026

i can’t tell if the sun is shining behind a thin cloud
or if the haze in the atmosphere has gotten that thick
but either way, i can feel the sun, but i can’t see the sky
i’m hoping one day this will all be some kind of
terrible
memory
dream
fiction
past

[but i’m not counting on it]

July 6, 2026

it’s seven o’clock
and i’m writing
and the wind is blowing
and my wrist has not yet started hurting [as much as it was yesterday]
and the birds are screaming
and the dog is observing
and the cat is nowhere to be seen

the tea is hot
the coffee is ice cold
and the water is the temperature of our old house’s old pipes
[so, in the summer, not quite as cool as we’d like]
[and in the winter far too cold]
but it’s a summer day
a summer morning
and the window is open
and the rain will be falling all day today
and i hope it feels like the planet is healing
so we, as a species, can maybe follow suit.

October 4, 2025

half asleep
half awake
half in love with
half the people
here on half this earth
[though i love the whole planet
like i can’t get away from
my own desires, crying when i see
a single beam of sun
encroach over the horizon
of a view i’ve never seen in real life/
or simply the leaves of trees
i always see
but rarely really
look at
on my daily commute
using human infrastructure
and human pathways
to get to human-created endeavors
and human-built buildings
but right here
are magics
we could never
ever
ever begin to
develop on our own
without the pathways led to us
for us
from the
earth]

every
single thing
on this planet
is so fucking special
i cannot
cannot
get over it

[this could include
humans
and humanity…

does it?]

December 8, 2024

i think
my “problem”
is that i have big picture
thinking
with tiny detail
brain
and that just makes everything
overwhelming
all the time

~~~

like
i can see the whole planet
and each conflict
and how the systems lead to suffering
and how it
literally
doesn’t
need
to be
this way
but instead of just thinking about the systems
i then ‘zoom in’ and see
each country
each family
each child
each breath of the earth
suffering
suffering
suffering
and i am stuck
because i don’t want to look away
for fear i’ve cheapened
their individual
suffering
and story
but it’s hard to hold
hundreds
thousands
millions
billions
of people’s individual narratives
in a brain trained to only concentrate on one’s own
so i panic
and breathe hard
and fast
and when the feeling has finally passed
there’s the guilt
there’s the guilt
and i know it’s all going to happen
again and again and again

~~~

so how in this world do i utilize
my big picture imagination and individual compassion
without falling into
obsession?
without falling into the chain reaction of
‘i’ve decided to help one thing/cause/person —
‘but wait, this other person has it worse/’
‘but wait, this other cause is more just/’
‘but wait, this other thing runs so much deeper
and has its tendrils in so many of the other
horrors of this world…’

how do i stop my decision paralysis
when it comes to helping
human decency?

[i honestly don’t know

do you?]

September 2, 2021

there was a moment,
a whole slew of moments,
a good month or so,
when everyone was staying indoors
trying desperately
to stop the spread,
and magic occurred:
the air cleared of smog
and wildlife returned to where it hadn’t been seen
for ages
and nature began reclaiming
her[/their] right to this earth…

and for a pessimist such as myself,
this brought a huge abundance of joy to my heart;
i’d like nothing more than to save this planet,
give each creature on this earth the right and respect to this land
as we once had
[yes, i am including us in that we]
[though we being humanity, probably/possibly not we being my particular race]
to actually be as equal as nature created us
but…
if we really have been as terrible for this planet
as i expect
and we do in fact go through a mass-extinction event
[moreso than we are going through now]
it brings comfort to my heart that nature can reclaim
so quickly
so easily…
i still worry about each individual bird and dolphin and seedling
[and human being]
but it comforts me a little
to know that, as a whole
maybe we haven’t made such an
unerasable
footprint.