In crossing the border, look out for the ice, For
warming’s no worry in lands of the free. The
traffic of progress plants one sinful seed. Fact
hides in all fiction, read everything thrice.
Cling to this knowing, ignorance has a price. As
names of large puddles melt from our memory,
Foreign goods bleed out into stormy, high seas.
Advance! Don’t retreat! Truth demands sacrifice.
The barge trundles in, a disruption so brusque
It makes ivory cups shatter, spilling teardrops
Shed because elephants keep losing their tusks.
Scattered in the breeze, history’s left with no husk.
Apples are googling down primely bruised hilltops.
The new world’s perfume stinks with old, rotten
musk.
Ella Erdahl is a fourth-year student from Minnesota majoring in Creative Writing, Hispanic Studies, and Comparative Literature. When confronted with the state of the world, she likes to cope with poetry and caffeine.
