“Miss Temple, why do you read by the inlet where the whales die?” My fourth-grade student cried. April 10th 2020, I plunged back into my natural habitat. Gazing over the steel inlet rail, I observed an anomaly. Translucent ripples ripped into my quaint Manasquan seashore. Unripe sea glass nor plastic debris littered the dog beach bend. The water forced me to be reflective; typically, the teal tint tainted and obscured our interaction. Three weeks of required absenteeism: Covid, you were a killer of people, but a healer for nature. Our forced reclusion reduced pollution’s inclusion.
Engines are silenced.
No boats bother the blessed sea.
Waves sing gleefully.
Hardly three years later, we are worse than pre-disease. Speculations of new disruptions disseminate on the internet. Wind turbines, oil spills, reckless ships, a plethora of possibilities could be to blame. Nevertheless, we humans can be inhumane. Carcasses carried away, creating momentary concern. News outlets report that human contacts may have caused 43 whales’ deaths in 2022. The Snapple bottle lying next to the recently deceased whale should snap us out of our ignorant delusions. Our reemergence shouldn’t have been an imposition, placing the balance of nature in another untangling food chain condition.
Engines igniting—
Why bother the blessed sea?
Waves sing, mournfully.