Poetry

FEBRUARY 2020

Glacier Imitation

by STEPHEN SIPERSTEIN

My voice is not my voice.
It is the sound of place
speaking through me:

slope and stone
moss, cone, and valley.

I grit my teeth on ash

and dust. Before you arrived
I made my own weather.
Your air fills me

yet I can’t breathe
as I recede

mountains rise.

Stephen Siperstein

Dr. Stephen Siperstein currently lives and teaches at the Environmental Immersion Program at Choate Rosemary Hall. His research and publications focus on developing effective strategies for interdisciplinary climate change education with a focus on teaching climate justice, and he is co-editor of the 2016 volume Teaching Climate Change in the Humanities. Stephen also co-leads the Environmental Literature Institute, a summer conference dedicated to training educators in teaching the environmental humanities. His current joys include tagging monarch butterflies and exploring the forests and coastlines of New England with his family.