Laura Wells – Solutions

Billions of people want to “Go Green.”
The confusion is, just what does that mean?

What can we do? It’s not hard to deduce:
we can reuse and recycle but the key is REDUCE!

We’ve heard from Thoreau, “As you simplify your life,”
you’ll undoubtedly have less toil and strife.

But can we be happy, and still “save the earth?”
Can we learn about value, and what things are worth?

Like, who’s “worth” a billion, if others lack food?
Without billionaires, would our world come unglued?

Let’s go back to the fifties’ 91% tax.
Reduce 1% wealth so we all can relax.

In summary what we want and need
is health and well-being, not unfettered greed.

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Eco-socialism is rising, crony capitalism has flunked.
“A rising tide lifts all boats” has been thoroughly debunked.

The parties of war and Wall Street are not on our side.
They’re like two big Titanics ignoring the tide.

About families and gender they seem polarized,
but on war and Wall Street they’re quite synchronized.

And we seem to be cruising in the wrong direction
with environmental attack instead of environmental protection.

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One by one individually we can all do our part,
but to tackle huge problems, we have to take heart.

Our will to cooperate can be resurrected.
Big change happens best when we get reconnected.

Look to the parties, Peace & Freedom and Green.
We’re not corporate-funded and that keeps us clean.

For parties and candidates, no corporate money is key.
It says to the billionaires, “You cannot buy me!”

So then when we govern we are not corrupted,
Our commitment to solutions is not interrupted.

More healthcare, less war, fewer prisons, more schools.
Get rid of ridiculous “anti-everyone” rules.

Green voter registration helps green values increase.
Over profit, we place people, planet and peace.

“Another world is possible” is a saying to trust,
To “save the earth,” let’s do what we must!

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And now it’s time to bring this rhyme home.
Feel free to send me lines to add to the poem.

As an afterword, I will copy below,
A much fuller quote by Henry David Thoreau.

AFTERWORD

“I learned this, at least, by my experiment;
that if one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams,
and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined,
he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.
He will put some things behind, will pass an invisible boundary;
new, universal, and more liberal laws will begin
to establish themselves around and within him;
or the old laws be expanded,
and interpreted in his favor in a more liberal sense,
and he will live with the license of a higher order of beings.
In proportion as he simplifies his life,
the laws of the universe will appear less complex,
and solitude will not be solitude,
nor poverty poverty, nor weakness weakness.
If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost;
that is where they should be.
Now put the foundations under them.”
― Henry David Thoreau, Walden and Civil Disobedience