A poem about melting glaciers
By: Bibiana Egbunike
A mass of scintillating white is crumbling into the sea
trapped tightly in the clutches of heat with nowhere to flee
its arms once stretched high in the mountains and over the land
the increased temperature, it cannot withstand
First a drop, a trickle, then a wave
our mighty glaciers, we refuse to save
rising sea levels as oceans embrace the ground
a whispered warning, “the coasts shall be drowned”
The glaciers are melting! Our worst fears
to see it ever massive, transparent tears
Greenland, Antarctica, all our great mountains
or perhaps in the near future, our ever-flowing fountains
to err is human, oh but a grave one we have made
the price of nature, too vast to be paid
Oh polar bears, arctic foxes, walruses and seals
what deep incertitude, you certainly must feel
The great lakes at least, a worthy souvenir
If our ice sheets, in time, should ever disappear
Like the last ray of light before darkness claims the night
through slips and slides, it resists with all its might
but piece by piece it falls apart, a chilling sight
a cataclysmic performance of breaking white.
The UW Radicle 