environmental justice

This is a time for remembering.
For slowing down.
For stopping.

This is a time for pausing long enough to see the system for what it truly is.
How we’ve been trapped by it.
How we are held prisoner to our eight-hour work days.
This could be a time to let the system reset.
Do we really want to go back to things as they used to be?

Sometimes we have to get sick to remember what it means to be healthy.
Sometimes we have to break our hip to remember what it means to walk.
Sometimes we don’t ask for the gifts in life that we receive.
Sometimes we don’t even recognize them as gifts.

So as the smoke clears.
As the cars stop.
As the buses, trains, and planes move empty.
This is a time to sit still.
To be where we are.
This is a time to not rush off to the next event, the next coffee, onto the next sports game.

Maybe in this time we will find a reticent joy of returning to the simple things.
Maybe call someone you haven’t talked to in a really long time.
Maybe even in this time we will eat a little less.
Perhaps we will meditate a little more.
Maybe read an old journal from a decade ago.

This might be a time to empty your closet.
This might be a time to resurrect old passions.
This might be a time to think, “What on Earth is going on?”

The Amazon rainforests have been burning and we haven’t stopped.
The Coral reefs around the world have been decimated and we haven’t stopped.
The Polar icecaps have been melting at a dizzying rate and we haven’t stopped.

Maybe we should take a second and reevaluate?
Why have we not yet stopped?
Why can’t we stop.

This might be a time for us to stop and watch the birds.
They have so much to teach us.
Let us listen to their songs.
Let us protect the planet.
Let us not go back to our old ways.

-written by Hawah Kasat
March 15, 2020