-derived from natural facts presented in the BBC Planet Earth series
Lakes of lava in
molten Ethiopia —
Hell’s ceiling on earth
Gobi desert snow
disobeys physical law —
Won’t melt in summer
K2, five miles high
Guardian of Shangri-La
Geese scale the apex
Hungry grizzly bears
Flip rocks to find Spring treasure —
Rocky Mountain moths
Cave mollies trip out,
breathing streams of delicious
sulfuric acid
Nests of saliva
Swiftlet eggs on high cave walls
Spit-shiny sconces
Wallabies dig holes,
lick their arms in desert heat
Coolest ‘roos around
Saharan desert
Toads on nightly pest control
Nowhere to hide, fleas
Death Valley cries rain
Dormant seeds rejoice and shout
Thirty-year silence
Red-billed Quelea
Like Serengeti thunder
Billions choke the sky
Polar bears starving —
Walruses circle their young
Seals off the menu
Be nice to oceans
Three fourths of our oxygen:
Diatom algae
On earth, without legs,
Most abundant animal
feeds the largest: krill
General Sherman
weighs as much as ten blue whales
Moby Sequoia
Andes flamingoes
Locked each night in frozen lakes
Ice cold knee socks
Swordbill hummingbird
Beak longer than its body —
Three foils when flying
Amazon jungle
Canopy vapor shower
Makes its own weather
Brazil jaguar
dines on quarry its own size —
Caiman crocodile
Costa Rican trick:
Fungi glows cool white at night
Spores hitchhike on moths
Desert Harris hawks
Birds of prey hunting in packs
Choice by necessity
Butcher Bird’s trophies
Mouse, vole, lizard, rattlesnake —
Cactus spine pantry
Mumbai city streets
Nightlife traffic squeal and snort
Leopards prowl for pig
-Hugh Findlay
Hugh Findlay lives in Durham, NC, and would rather be caught fishing. He drives a little red MG, throws darts on Tuesdays, reads and writes a lot, dabbles in photography and makes a pretty good gumbo. His work has most recently been published in The Dominion Review, Literary Accents, Tiny Seed Literary Journal, Bangalore Review, Burningwood Literary Journal, Wanderlust, Montana Mouthful and Dream Noir.