I didn’t appreciate my literature classes in high school. I was a Team Numbers guy, not a Team Words guy. Silly me - I didn’t realize those teams weren’t actually competing for anything.

I have a much richer appreciation for literature now, one that has developed organically over the last 15 years. Science fiction and fantasy top my list of favorite literary genres, but I still find pleasure in others. Even poetry, which I’ve tended to never quite “get,” has a growing appeal. Recently, I enjoyed the heck out of a poem I stumbled upon: “To a Mouse” by 18th century Scottish poet Robert Burns.

One line in the poem really grabbed me: “I’m truly sorry Man’s dominion / Has broken Nature’s social union….” Written nearly 200 years prior to the environmental movement’s beginning, this might as well be our motto.