As mother nature’s
Punitive measure
Against a society
In maintaining
The statuesque
That doesn’t bother,
Our rivers
Had become subject
To a water thirst,
To the extent
Of projecting
Rocky ribs
Terrifyingly protruded out
For easy count!
But now thanks to
The all-out, terrace-making
And reforestation effort
Of each catchment
Farmers have made a point
And also to the afforestation
Move of the government
Rivers aside from quenching
Their insatiable thirst
Have resumed
To brim over
With floods
Drinking water
To their hearts’ content.
Our forests once stripped of
Their wooded cover
Have started, fast, to recover
From afar they are seen
Robed eye-catching green
From a fry-pan sky
Allowing a shelter
Also busy
Carbon to sequester.
Wild animals
That migrated
Have preferred
Back their way to find.
Now farmers don’t have
Deep to dig
To sink a water well
Or find a nearby spring.
Birds are heard chirruping
Be it winter, summer or spring,
While Brooks bubbling.
Buzzing and hovering
From this to that flower
Bees are producing
Organic honey by the hour.
Promising a bumper harvest
Farmer’s plots have
Fortunately continued
To resuscitate!
Those leaving
Their denuded abode behind
Away, who preferred
To stay
‘We will return back
home soon! ’
Is what
They say.
Happily enough
Mother nature
Affords us a second chance
Imbued with
Environment stewardship
If we are willing to mend
Our wrong ‘Feast today
famine tomorrow! ’ stance.
To dispel the spectre
Of climate change
And systematically face
The global challenge
True to the adage
‘We have either to
swim together
or sink together! ’
Hence in fighting the challenge
Or adapting to the change
Back scratching,
We have to be on the same page.
Indeed, irrigation must
Not slip our mind
For erratic rainfall
A lasting solution
If we must find.
BY ALEM HAILU G/KRISTOS
THE ETHIOPIAN HERALD FRIDAY 23 AUGUST 2024
