Listen Carefully (a poem)

Listen Carefully


Today is our opportunity to learn from a wise woman,
A gentle and softly spoken soul that requires careful attention
Consider her message as highly essential
Before she speaks, let me just list her credentials

Inventor and teacher, provider and preacher
Come, listen in to our wonderful speaker
Will we hear her voice,
Through all the noise?

Magnificent Mathematics arranger of art
Symmetry and Patterns she knows off by heart
Her artistic masterpieces hang in galleries round the world
People flock from distant lands to see her works unfurled

Well qualified to speak in both Science and Theology
In Physics, Horticulture and Molecular Biology
This woman inspired many of our greatest thinkers

Experts realise her teaching methods generate real thought
Charging thousands for students to be immersed in how she taught
Her curriculum is not a race, learning happens at students pace
They discover, ask questions, create and play
Think for themselves and are sent on their way
Imagine, experiment through trial and error
All learning styles catered for what could be fairer?

This woman we discuss
Educational genius
Her motto 'Long live curiosity and adventure'

Her school is free for all, not a single charge to pay
For some reason enrollments are getting smaller every single day
They're always open too, so you can't be late to class
With miles of playground that make ours look like a farce
Come, give it a chance, then you'll agree
It's the best school going around guaranteed

Look to the skies,
things too big to describe
Feelings of awe, simply open your door
Do you get the sense there's something more?
Patience, waiting for crops to grow,
or rain to come, or clearing snow
Consequence, touching spiky plants
or stepping on a nest of ants,
Or going alone and risking attack
Constantly having to watch your back
In community we find the safety of a pack,
Can't shirk, hard work, in Nature's school
Laziness invariably exposing the fool
“Shelter, yeah that idea sounds clever
I'll get around to it...whenever”
Now it's too late, in the cold of night
Fingers numb, you have no light
The night feels long and lingers on
Dare not complain or take aim with blame
Out here you can't play the, “not my fault” game
That long hard night teaches me,
To take responsibility
In Nature's school you reap what you sow
And if you plant nothing, then nothing will grow

We depend on each other and on the land
We depend on teamwork and being well planned
Gently flowing rivers teach us to deal with frustrations
Watching water carve a path with persistence and patience
The water wont give up, even though it's being mocked
Giant stones laugh proudly, and the flow seems all but blocked,
As streams we tend to give up at the first sight of a clock
“It's too hard”, we complain but as we watch this stream in shock
We witness a gently flowing river, H2 0wning rock!

With curiosity and adventure these things were uncovered
What other lessons lay outside and wait to be discovered?


An apple falling from a tree
got Edisons attention
We all know about gravity but...

Have we considered the apple an invention?

All our creativity, comes back to nature
We plagiarized her ideas, then took turns to rape her

Non-stick frying pans from a ducks back
Ideas for warm clothing stolen from yaks
We take what she gave us and cultivate cheese
Made Air-Con, experiencing a fresh summer breeze
Artwork we've admired
From her was inspired
A Fridge from the snow
A Watch from shadows
Showers for waterfalls
Bamboo for Soccer balls
Planes that have grown
From birds that have flown
Knives from sharp stones
No ideas our own

A huge walk-in pantry, a giant hardware store
A doctors clinic and oh so much more.
Mother Nature used to speak, but sometimes I wonder
Have we gone deaf in the land down under?

Please, I beg you, come and see
Bet you didn't know pepperoni came from a tree.


Rain pours and thunder roars
We run and hide, it's safe indoors
The world is too great, to sit inside and ignore
Get up, get outside, go and explore
“Wow”, we exclaim, watching National Geographic
I'll go there one day but right now, stuck in traffic
Disconnected from nature, completely unplugged
Your PC probably, the last thing you debugged!
Come and see, I urge you, take a look
But there's no wireless out there to update Facebook!

But from the clutches some manage escape...

When did nature become the exception rather than the rule?
When did sterile portables replace the outdoor school?
Correct me if I'm wrong, I may be mistaken
The “real world” is the one to which we now awaken
Filled with busyness, files and shopping in aisles
Not the sunrise that greets me and causes a smile
Or that useless un-developed land that's been here a while.
Life is money, deadlines and a paperwork pile
Well I guess I'll take the fairyland with which I'm contented
With Mother Nature, mountains, trees, and what God invented.

Andrew