This Earth, this spinning, orbiting ball
of rock with a sizzling center--like
a weird truffle candy--seems
to want to cover itself in carbon-addicted
life: weeds, trees, vines, moss, lichen,
brush, and on and greening on. Well,
it is chilly in space, so why not grow a coat?
I love to see cracks in concrete
become narrow weed gardens,
to see vacant city lots turn into
jungles, which people of course
turn into dumps for paper, aluminum,
and bloody needles. And
think of the underground,
the massive, brute tangle of
leg-sized roots under a conifer
forest, my God. Vast tendril
clusters under pastures. Can
a planet have a will? I think so:
The Earth will keep sneezing
seeds, rooting rhyzomes,
making bulb-grenades, pulling
vines out of vines, calling
its berserk plant-army into
peaceful, triumphant war.
Hans Ostrom 2024
