And Suddenly We Grew Brave

Day 29: Today's RWP prompt was to choose news headlines and work elements of them into a poem. I chose headlines from the science section (online) of The New York Times. They were:

Like Origami, Pollen Grains Fold Just So

The Search for Genes Leads to Unexpected Places

Found Alive: The Loch Ness Monster of the Northwest Prairie. Alas, it Disappoints.

I also used the Poetic Asides prompt, which was to begin the title of a poem with, "And Suddenly."

And Suddenly We Grew Brave

For many moons, we cowered in the tall grasses

Of our hearts, afraid.

Our truth was as elusive as the Loch Ness Monster,

So somewhere along the way we stopped looking.

We mastered the art of folding ourselves up

Into pleasing forms, like origami

And only unraveling on sleepless nights

Or in quiet rooms with the blinds drawn.

We were purposeless

as pollen grains carried by the wind.

And then one day the wind whispered words,

The echoes of our genes, stories from our ancestors

Long forgotten. We dug our hands into the earth

And drank falling rain. We doubted everything we

Had been taught and believed only what we felt.

We wondered again why we were here.

And we set out once more across

the vast prairies of fear,

millions of fireflies on a cloudy night.

This time we were not disappointed.