Your ice thaws,
the shiny shield
that deflects the sun
and protects you from heat.
Frozen for millennia,
it begins its long farewell.
Your permafrost softens—
invulnerable for ages,
it disgorges methane and carbon
into the global greenhouse,
heating things up.
Your melting faster
than in thousands of years
awakens ancient microbes,
releasing them
from their glacial captivity,
for both good and evil.
Your newly born meltwater,
fresh and cold, liberated
from its amnion,
floods into the warm salty ocean,
like a hormonal imbalance
slowing its circulation.
Your shedding rain
at your highest peak,
for the first time in memory
weeping for the Earth.
About the Poem
A Major Alarm Is Flashing Under Greenland’s Ice, Wired , November 7, 2023
A new study reports that Greenland’s ice sheet is melting from below (as well as from above) due to the warmer ocean and changing atmospheric currents pushing warm, tropical water toward its coast. Its northern ice shelves have already lost a third of their volume. Greenland’s melting ice sheet has a major impact on rising sea levels on America’s east coast. This is another indication that climate change is accelerating as positive feedback loops have unexpected consequences, reinforcing warming.
About the Author
Anne Gruner is a Pushcart-nominated writer whose poetry has appeared in over a dozen print and on-line publications, including “Amsterdam Quarterly Review,” “Beltway Poetry Quarterly,” “Plum Tree Tavern,” “Honeyguide Literary Magazine,” and “Jalmurra.”