How did it feel, the tremor of that collective gasp?
Carbon dioxide breathed from millions
of mouths in the moment of horror, when you knelt
and asked, What is priceless, what do we protect?

Did you kneel because your knees shook? Perhaps
you were pleading for every artist to paint
the last burst of sunflowers torched to a shriveled world.
I’m certain it was you - leaning forward

in the front row at the college’s half full lecture
when the scientist sighed, If only
carbon dioxide was orange. Did you imagine
all of us waking up engulfed in a soup of opaque air

and was that the moment you knew
you could make us notice?