Collection
No one means harm as they hit
Wiffle balls off a cruise ship fan tail,
cut loose snarl of fishing lines or nets,
toss Styrofoam cups from boats into breezes,
or gather garbage into seaside dumps –
throw it away.
Refuse, released from land by storms
or careless toss, collects, enters Pacific gyre,
follows currents to sieve of Midway Island.
Piles of plastic accumulate –
laundry baskets, toy figures, fishing gear floats,
cigarette lighters, toothbrushes, nylon rope fragments,
gas cans, ice chests, mountains of Styrofoam pieces.
Invisible nylon fishing gear or six-pack rings
entangle Hawaiian Monk Seals and spinner dolphins
cause infection, drowning, reduced feeding.
Surface-feeding Laysan albatross parents collect
small items from the jetsam as they gather squid
to feed their young. Undigestible debris accumulates
in each chick's crop. Many starve,
throats full of emptiness –
no one means them harm.
Activism Sets Sail
"Never believe that a few caring people can't change the world. For, indeed, that's all who ever have." Margaret Mead
When fifteen-year-old Greta Thunberg
gave up eating meat, flying in airplanes,
crossed the Atlantic Ocean in a carbon neutral yacht,
she made a point – treat Mother Earth with respect,
reduce your carbon footprint.
Born out of frustration due to global climate inaction,
she is the youthful face of School Strike for Climate
and Fridays for Future. She models
responsible use of Earth resources.
Greta points to glaring evidence of global warming:
forest and bush fires burn uncontrolled,
coastal communities threatened by sea level rise,
coral bleaching and barrier reef demise in warm seas,
increase in catastrophic weather events worldwide,
air quality full of unhealthy particulates.
Thunberg is mobilizing youth world-wide
whose future is in the hands of adult lawmakers.
Move over Rachel Carson. Thanks to Greta,
a new generation of activism has set sail.
Hers is a nine-one-one alarm –
Our house is on fire!
Creation Trembles, A Golden Shovel Poem
"At my touch/ the wild braid/ of creation trembles."
Stanley Kunitz, The Snakes of September
Earth is warming at
an alarming rate. My
brow is sweaty to the touch
as I consider our future now. The
news is filled with weather wild
and yet no incantation can undo the braid
between ecosystem and plunder of
of our sacred creation,
that before its collapse, trembles.
Lynn M. Hansen is a retired Modesto Junior College Professor of marine biology. A member of Ina Coolbrith Circle, Orinda, CA, MoSt Poetry Center, Modesto and National League of American Pen Women, her work reflects her sense of place and art of story-telling. She enjoys gardening with native plants, photography, cooking and writing. With her husband Richard Anderson she has traveled to all five continents and enjoys adventures in different cultural realms. In 2013 a collection of her poems was published by Quercus Review Press entitled Flicker, Poems by Lynn M. Hansen. She is currently writing an historical novel about her maternal grandmother, Mernie Daisy Lewis, 1882-1963.
No one means harm as they hit
Wiffle balls off a cruise ship fan tail,
cut loose snarl of fishing lines or nets,
toss Styrofoam cups from boats into breezes,
or gather garbage into seaside dumps –
throw it away.
Refuse, released from land by storms
or careless toss, collects, enters Pacific gyre,
follows currents to sieve of Midway Island.
Piles of plastic accumulate –
laundry baskets, toy figures, fishing gear floats,
cigarette lighters, toothbrushes, nylon rope fragments,
gas cans, ice chests, mountains of Styrofoam pieces.
Invisible nylon fishing gear or six-pack rings
entangle Hawaiian Monk Seals and spinner dolphins
cause infection, drowning, reduced feeding.
Surface-feeding Laysan albatross parents collect
small items from the jetsam as they gather squid
to feed their young. Undigestible debris accumulates
in each chick's crop. Many starve,
throats full of emptiness –
no one means them harm.
Activism Sets Sail
"Never believe that a few caring people can't change the world. For, indeed, that's all who ever have." Margaret Mead
When fifteen-year-old Greta Thunberg
gave up eating meat, flying in airplanes,
crossed the Atlantic Ocean in a carbon neutral yacht,
she made a point – treat Mother Earth with respect,
reduce your carbon footprint.
Born out of frustration due to global climate inaction,
she is the youthful face of School Strike for Climate
and Fridays for Future. She models
responsible use of Earth resources.
Greta points to glaring evidence of global warming:
forest and bush fires burn uncontrolled,
coastal communities threatened by sea level rise,
coral bleaching and barrier reef demise in warm seas,
increase in catastrophic weather events worldwide,
air quality full of unhealthy particulates.
Thunberg is mobilizing youth world-wide
whose future is in the hands of adult lawmakers.
Move over Rachel Carson. Thanks to Greta,
a new generation of activism has set sail.
Hers is a nine-one-one alarm –
Our house is on fire!
Creation Trembles, A Golden Shovel Poem
"At my touch/ the wild braid/ of creation trembles."
Stanley Kunitz, The Snakes of September
Earth is warming at
an alarming rate. My
brow is sweaty to the touch
as I consider our future now. The
news is filled with weather wild
and yet no incantation can undo the braid
between ecosystem and plunder of
of our sacred creation,
that before its collapse, trembles.
Lynn M. Hansen is a retired Modesto Junior College Professor of marine biology. A member of Ina Coolbrith Circle, Orinda, CA, MoSt Poetry Center, Modesto and National League of American Pen Women, her work reflects her sense of place and art of story-telling. She enjoys gardening with native plants, photography, cooking and writing. With her husband Richard Anderson she has traveled to all five continents and enjoys adventures in different cultural realms. In 2013 a collection of her poems was published by Quercus Review Press entitled Flicker, Poems by Lynn M. Hansen. She is currently writing an historical novel about her maternal grandmother, Mernie Daisy Lewis, 1882-1963.
