Sestina for the Animals - Coleman Miller

It’s in the way the birds fly,

the weeping willow weeps,

and the mammals share.

Reptiles won’t let on,

but they are on high!

Dawn springs forth, fresh.

Bugs are whimsical and free.

You find that the march-fly,

finds no price too high,

to feed upon its weeds.

Take a moment to look on.

Can you find your share?

Oceans hide smiling sharks.

Dogs were the saddest ones,

Parrots, however, started fresh,

they chatted and began to fly.

Voles surfaced for a few weeks.

Flowers grew to be six feet high!

As plants grew, Kudzu was highest.

Vegetation, unafraid, began to share,

and thus Animalia happily wept.

United, together, wholly-fresh.

All for one, and let cautions fly,

Now with a planet humans aren’t on.

Civilization carried on and on,

their only concern was getting higher,

they mastered the earth, the mastered the sky,

Humanity believed in nothing but expanding their share.

At the end of days, at the end of shares, at the end of fresh

Crashes, bangs, and waterless floods, humanity weeps.

And, at first, us beasts were weeping,

until we noticed it all passed on,

Earth was raked fresh.

We lived a high.

We shared.

We flew.

The pets still weep and look up high.

We keep them on pace, and give them a share,

We reveal a fresh new world and teach them to fly.