Aubade for the Anthropocene
In order to highlight the increasing threat that climate change plays in our day to day life, "Aubade for the Anthropocene," reimagines the figure of Mother Earth as a woman left forgotten at dawn in an attempt to parallel the effects of global warming with the delicacy of a human life.
Anthropocene, ecopoetics, climate change, global warming, lyrical, post-nature, postnurture, aubade, mother earth
AUBADE FOR THE ANTHROPOCENE
Outside, a tree, dried out & skeletal, moans. Deadin spring. The roots can't find water. It's May,the city isn't greening anymore, & trees are sickof the sun. Say the sky's the sickblue of hospitalwalls. Say her name as she coughs & gags in predawnheat. She tried so hard to be loved she cradledmy head against her breast & cried until she had nomore fluids & sorry, I'm sorry, don't leave me. Saywe never liked her scars, the riverbeds of sweat,her skin, porous & delicate. & the flowers, wilted.The tulips. The gardenias. The freshbright gleamof stems & leaves, of used things fisting tightto pleasure. Say we are postnature. Say we arenurtureless. Gone in the smog slit through with light. [End Page 38]
Caitlin Ferguson holds an mfa in creative writing from Rutgers University-Newark. Her work has appeared in Tar River Poetry, Twyckenham Notes, and 2River View, among others. Currently, she lives in Las Cruces, New Mexico, where she works as an adjunct professor.
