after Sara Teasdale’s “There will come the soft rains”
The sleet will come when we are dead,
all of us dead, all humanity in the ground.
The ground will thaw and freeze again,
and thaw. The millipedes will crawl.
Some passerine will call and flap and circle
in the shimmer of light on a pond.
There will be sounds
but not our sounds. There will be cares
for the ways of the world
for eating, for procreating, for rest.
There will be the smell of rain
and man-less whistling and dawn.
Shirin Abedinirad, House in the Wind, 2017. Land art, Marrakesh, Morocco. Created in collaboration with Nikon and BMW Mini, the work imagines the desert as an open studio where, in the artist’s words, “my studio has no walls, no roof, and no borders.” With sky as ceiling, horizons as walls, and wind, mirrors, clouds, and sand as collaborators, the installation becomes a meditation on nature as partner, sanctuary, and boundless space of belonging. Artwork courtesy of featured artist Shirin Abedinirad.
