Watch Us Burn

Call it eco-poetry, a naturalist's manifesto or a simple outcry against destruction of the natural world, the poems in Watch Us Burn by Gene Twaronite offer hard-earned inquiry into our ongoing ecological crisis. Trees offer "signals" that we ignore at our peril. When will we ever learn to read these signals? Twaronite asks, adding his voice to the tree chorus, not within Whitman's notion of the "superber race," but as a humble advocate for the earth we are losing.

-Carol Muske-Dukes, author and former Poet Laureate, California

Through his poetry, Gene Twaronite captures both the beauty and the sorrow inherent in our rapidly changing environment. Each poem, rich with vivid imagery and evocative language, invites readers to contemplate the urgent environmental challenges facing our planet and the consequences of our actions. His poetry frequently employs metaphors as a tapestry, emphasizing the intricate connections that bind every element of nature together. From the smallest microbe to the secret signals exchanged among trees, or the powerful link we feel with gorillas, his work highlights how each thread is essential to the integrity of the whole. In the complexities of our encounters with the environment, especially the role of fire in a warming global climate, he illustrates how these moments can be transformative and irreversibly destructive. This is a poignant and sobering collection of poems that hopefully will inspire readers to pursue an alternate future reality.

-Les Corey, retired conservation executive and forest ecologist

These poems speak from within the age of climate grief without turning away from attention or affection. Twaronite writes as a naturalist - someone who has actually walked and watched this planet - and it shows. Watch Us Burn is a book of desert light, fossil time, and hard questions about what we're doing to the more-than-human world, yet it keeps returning to moments of beauty and connection that feel like small acts of repair.

-Scott Bryson, author, Ecopoetry: A Critical Introduction and The West Side of Any Mountain