Orion

When the Time’s Toxins

When the time’s toxins
have seeped into every cell

and like a salted plot
from which all rain, all green, are gone

I and life are leached 
of meaning

somehow a seed
of belief

sprouts the instant
I acknowledge it:

little weedy hardy would-be 
greenness

tugged upward 
by light

while deep within
roots like talons

are taking hold again 
of this our only earth.

— Christian Wiman

Join Christian Wiman, poets Pattiann Rogers, and Maria Melendez, and Orion for a live web event about poetry tomorrow at 4 p.m. Eastern. Click here for more information and to register (don’t worry—it’s free, but required.)