One and the Same
This poem was inspired by Wind River Ranch/Rio Mora National Wildlife Refuge.
Editors’ Note: Occasionally, the word art of poetry conveys something much more than the text. Anabella Miller’s poem “One and the Same” is such a piece. It powerfully and beautifully conveys the spirit of both wild Nature and The Rewilding Institute’s efforts to protect and restore it.
You know me well
You know the curvature of my hills
And how my cliffs form a rocky abyss
You understand how my river carved me
You know I am a home
And that you are simply a temporary guest
That you may leave me
When the others may not
To live in a place of asphalt rivers
But I ask you to love me
Wherever you go
And to not forget me
Do not forget my vast blue skies
Speckled with those tall, dark clouds from the West
My gleaming, golden fields
Studded with yellow flowers
Buzzing with life
That you may not forget
That I will still be here
When I gasp for water
When I choke with smoke
As my trees grow quiet
When they once held flurries of birds
When my stream no longer flows
I ask that you help me, or
Have you already forgotten me?
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I’ll always yearn to see your glowing sunsets
Your grazing bison
To hear the singing frogs
The touch of your soft grass
Your fresh, cooling waters
And the feeling of lucidity, finally
I know your dangers
And I fear it
But I know the dangers you face
And I fear that exceedingly more
You are everything that is free
And everything that is true
It is all you
And all that I am is you.
Your endangerment is mine.
–By Anabella Miller
Anabella Miller is currently a biology student at New Mexico Highlands University and will stay there for her M.S. She plans to go into conservation with an interest in ecology and wildlife, especially herps and mammals. She runs cross-country and steeplechase at NMHU.