Who Speaks for Our Mountains? Who Sings Their Songs?

During April,  City Lights Bookstore in Sylva, NC and I sponsored a poetry contest for Jackson County school students to help them--and all of us--- join in our annual Greening up the Mountains celebration.  Over the next few weeks I will be sharing the poems by some of these students.  These are the voices we should be heeding as we meet the challenges--- environmental and cultural--- that confront us here in our mountains.

                                                                       

Maia Wilde, who attends Cullowhee Valley School, 

 weaves a tapestry of images that invites us to enter the natural world, the wild home where she lives.   I particularly like the rocks "like wise old men and women," their presence being the bedrock of these ancient mountains. That the smell of pine sap gives her courage gives me hope that our children will grow into adulthood looking to the natural world for the strength  to take care of the places they love.  

Wild Home

By Maia Wilde--Cullowhee Valley School

Sun rays like stars at night

Dew shining

Wild flowers blooming

Twittering birds say hello to me

Snow falling

Wind like a warm

Blanket

Mountains cast a shadow on the valley

Rocks like wise old men and women

The sun is like fire at night

The smell of sap and pine gives me courage

              

The mountains I live in are vast and tricky

    

Get lost

     

Good luck