You Are Here: Poetry in the Natural World

by Ada Limon

I saw the friendly little red arrow that pointed to where I was on the map, its caption: You Are Here. It seemed not only to serve as a locator, but as a reminder that I was living right now, breathing in the woods, that there was life around me, that the natural world was right here and I was a part of it; I was nature too.

there is more time to plant trees, to write poems, to not just be in wonder at this planet, but to offer something back to it, to offer something back together.

Because nature is not a place to visit. Nature is who we are.

NATURE, WHICH CANNOT BE DRIVEN TO To drive to it is to drive through it.

Rain has eaten 1/4 of me yet I believe against all evidence these raindrops are my letters of recommendation here is a man worth falling on.

And then the day came, when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.

you’ll heavy the whining floorboards of the house you filled with animals as hurt and lost as you,