Greenland Sonnet
by John Kendall Hawkins
The pinpricks gathered into a fire all over his skin, down his collar, up his nose, in his pants. He started screaming, calling for help, inhaling mosquitoes, bellowing, crying. He'd had no idea where he was going.
- John Griesemer, No One Talks About Greenland (2001)
I went to Greenland. I heard it would soon be green.
I would have brought my love along to keep me warm,
but we've parted ways, slammed doors; she's off with the storm,
her hurricane ways, her pacific center, mean
now in the twisted eye of recriminations.
Thoughts, the grist for these Ind'gen blues on the jukebox,
bad whiskey neat, in a bar full of Qaqortoq's
finest Inuits, tossing with Danish-Asians
just flown in from Copenhagen, developers
looking for "Eskimo pie," they bucky-beaver smiled;
On TV giant desperate mosquitoes riled
by climate change, their reign of terror -- predators.
My cell phone rings. I'm on my sixth extinction drink.
It's my storm, Caroline, more stink, my ice cubes clink.
