1. the twenty first century experience

2. 5 Roles
The Poet
The Scientist
The Public Servant
The Wild One
The Humble

3. 5 Poets
Wendall Berry
Pattiann Rogers
Gary Snyder
Mary Oliver
Simon Ortiz

4. Quick profit
Mind will be punched
Do something that won’t compute
Free republic for which it stands
Praise ignorance
You will not live to harvest
Two inches of humus
Laugh
Be joyful
Please women more than men
Swear allegiance
More tracks than necessary
Practice resurrection

5. At least one eye
Invisible to some
Seeds of tadpoles
Brook trout have eyes
Flocks of water fleas
Red-legged grasshopper
Short-tailed shrew
Rodent-scoped eye
An eye for everything
Will not pass unnoticed
The star-nosed mole
So odd
Each copepod
Sensitive to the hour
At dusk to touch the dark
I have an eye myself
Wild and vigilant
Watch how I feed

6. The midnight halls
Filling life with rules
The end of many chambers
Governor sits, without dinner
Laws – budgets – codes
Till the oil runs out
Pines on the capitol grounds
Thinking about “the people”
The elegant company of Jupiter
Flashes of lightning
Governor came to visit
Napped all afternoon
Chickens must be tended
What would happen to the cars
Beside the pond we started laughing
Hissing under the pine trees
Striking deep in straw bales

7. Flung herself out of the grass
Enormous and complicated eyes
Wings open, floats away
How to fall down
How to kneel down
Be idle and blessed
Die at last
Wild and precious life
Rippled sand rifts
Lonesome for the young afternoon
Listens to the river
Coyote, he’s always somewhere
Good luck for him and for me
Reports of a shotgun
The animal in me crouches
Preference is for silence
Listen for the motion of sound

8. Achieving perspective
Toe hair by toe hair
Straight up through the sky
Galaxies of the Cygnus A cluster
Try to remember that
40,000 years full of gathering
The hard wrinkling of seed
To reach the one star nearest
Being swept away now
Molecule by molecule
At this moment
The widest arc of its elliptical turn
Despair for the world grows
The least sound in fear
Beauty on the water
Peace of wild things
Who do not tax their lives
Above me the day-blind stars
Rest in the grace of the world

9. In closing,
5 Roles
The Poet
The Scientist
The Public Servant
The Wild One
The Humble
Conservation
Professional

10. Promoting science-based stewardship.
Engaging active, retired, and aspiring
conservation professionals.
In 2012:
Host “conservation conversations” in
public libraries around the state,
discussing the science behind important
conservation issues, like clean water,
wildlife habitat, and ecosystem services.
Invite citizens, retired and active
professionals to join MNACP members
in a lively dialogue about important
stewardship issues.
Please come and join us.