Dear Generation C

 

DEAR GENERATION C,

Covid, Carbon, and Climate will define you.
Cohorts, Connections, and Community will unite you.
Collaboration, Cooperation, and Citizenship will move you.
Capitalism, Consumerism, and Colonialism will be Constrained by you.
Compassion will guide you.

Your Challenges are Colossal.

We Cede to you a world in Chaos,
but seeded with Cautious optimism
and the saplings of a Conservation Culture.
It’s not much,
but we’ll Continue to Cultivate all the Changes we Can.

We’re Cheering for you! Be Courageous!

Love,
The Baby Boomers, Gens X, Y, and Z, and the Millennials


© Mary Lee Hahn, 2022

Today's poem was inspired by ALL WE CAN SAVE and also by Seth Godin's newsletter "Seth's Blog." In it, he wonders,

"So what to call the next generation?

My co-authors Bruce Clark and Paige NeJame have coined the term “Generation C.” It’s so well-suited, I believe it’s going to stick.

C is for Covid, C is for Carbon, C is for Climate."

I agree. I think it will stick. Generation C it is. Now let's work to make the changes necessary to keep the global average temperature rise below 1.5° and let's arm Gen C with all the skills and attitudes they will need to carry through to the next generation.  

A Letter to My Future Self

 

Dear, Sincerely

Flickr Creative Commons Photo by Faruk Ateş

Dear Mac and Cheese,

I’ve got to hand it to you,
you perfected the whole dissemblance thing.
I mean, it was flat-out brilliant
disguising yourself in that box for all these years,
allowing generations of beginning (or lazy) cooks
to transform dust and rocks
into a creamy bowl of comfort.
Box-made, your color is, though, disturbingly unnatural.
Not quite the orange of the namesake fruit
nor of a winter sky at sunset.
Neither oriole nor monarch.
Not autumn or amber.
Perhaps closest to road gang prison uniform,
a subtle hint to alert the most observant cooks that
the box is actually a trap.
Half a lifetime of cooking wasted, spent colorblind and imprisoned,
I’m free now, and so are you.
I’ve grated a big mound of cheddar and American,
mixed in noodles, poured on cream, baked until crunchy on top.
We’ve escaped, and nothing can stop us from moving on
to smoked gouda, bacon, fresh peas, and a crisp panko topping.
Your palette is now my palate.


©Mary Lee Hahn, 2017






Sincerely, Mac and Cheese

I know I cannot erase the facts:
they will grow up motherless;
he will be achingly lonely.

Stir into me the courage of a wooden spoon,
bake me with a searing love,
deliver me to be eaten one spoonful at a time,

the same way a vast grief must be consumed.

This is all you can do.
This is all I can do.

©Mary Lee Hahn, 2017




My mentor text for these two poems was David Hernandez's book, Dear, Sincerely. His poem, "Sincerely, the Sky" was featured recently on The Writer's Almanac. I loved it so much that in a rare move, I clicked through to his book on Amazon. After a peek inside the book, I knew I wanted to own it.


There are 10 Dear or Sincerely poems in the book. I took the conversational tone of my first poem from Hernandez's "Dear Death." My sincerely poem is most like his "Sincerely, Paper Gown."