Model showing polar vortex shifting south. (earth.nullschool.net via Washington Post) u.s. capitol overrun by angry mob --
5 dead (so far) . . . meanwhile: 10 dead in norway after “quickclay” (like quick-sand, i guess, only clay) sluiced onto village, after “record rainfall” malaysia gets deluged, too: 4 human beings dead, 28k now evac’d; factory worker jusaili mat zain helped to find a steamshovel to evac some; his description = what climate chaos looks like: "it has been raining for three days, food is running low, some shops are closed. there are no government boats or heavy trucks to help.” bon chance (& sauve qui peut) ongoing drought in turkey evaporates reservoirs: & although “it’s freezing in uttarakhand, the forests are on fire”: 71% deficit of rain, oct-dec means soil is parched & “forest rivers are drying up” -- you see, while much of india was awash in monsoons, some parts weren’t -- it’s “deluge or drought” again records keep piling up like . . . like the bars on your cellphone. like . . . the blinking green gain on yr stereo getting louder, blaring at you . . . spain records lowest-ever temp (- 29.3 f); most rain in a single jan. day in chennai; & last year was kyiv’s hottest (since 1881) & how did i forget the medicane?! no — not a new u.s. govt. health program (no such thing), but a “mediterranean hurricane” hit greece in sept. -- hurricanes proliferating in the atlantic, gulf of mexico, s. pacific, n. pacific, indian ocean, u.s. midwest & sunny e. med. net-net: 2020 world-wide x-treme weather cost $210 billion, sez the reinsurance co. o — & in the atmosphere over n. pole, where a vortex warms and swirls like . . . a top slowing down and wobbling -- down into europe, asia, n. america. & finally, a new term: see, when you spew greenouse gasses as fast as we do, it takes a while for the air & the seas to heat up, but they do, no matter what you do in the meantime. this is called (wait for it) “committed warming.” o we’re committed alright, or should be, for what we’ve committed has landed us in hot waters, not warm, to which the people who run the heating globe have made a commitment on behalf of everyone
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Remember this? Eastern Australia from space, Jan. 4, 2020. lawrence, kansas, u.s.a.:
jan. 4 temps: hi: 49 f / normal 39 lo: 31 f / normal 18 we ended 2020 in a “moderate drought,” due to almost no precip sept. - dec.; but we ended it with a snowstorm, too, so that’s something. i thot 2021 was supposed to be when everything started getting better, but the climate still looks the same (viz., worse): 85” of snow in n. japan in 48 hrs: 140 flights cancelled, bullet train stopped, traffic trapped; all this caused by highest air pressure ever observed on planet earth (over mongolia) on one side; and deepest low-pressure ever recorded in n. pacific, on t’other; japan in between = big wind off the sea = lotsa snow = this is what i mean by “chaos.” meanwhile, in s. japan, 4200 humans still in shelters 6 mo. after floods, mudslides meanwhile, in malaysia, > 20k humans evac’d -- punishing monsoons (the forecast for china, the tornados in n. california, the flash flood in sucre, bolivia, the ongoing flooding nr lake victoria, the rainfall in dehli & luzon & n. queensland — there is a lot i leave out of this chron) more 2020 records: hottest yr on record in france (since records began, 1900); hottest yr on record in estonia (in 102 yrs); hottest yr on record in portland, maine; hottest july & aug. ever in phoenix; juneau, ak., withal, just got soaked under its rainest day ever recorded (dec. 1); & 2021 resolutions: i will not write about the disappearing glaciers 100s of millions rely upon for h2o i will not write about ice sheets’ melting & how it's helping coastal inundations i will not write about rainforests’ turning into grasslands, or grasslands turning into deserts, or loss of mangroves, leaving low coasts exposed to storms i will not write about where all the people who lived in all these places may go next i will not write about the arctic ocean’s turning into an ocean, complete with year-round ship traffic & year-round geopolitical jockeying, complete with nuclear-powered this and that i will not write about what’s happening to the world’s rarest tree, or the cute li’l animals, because you know about all that stuff already. no, i’ll keep writing about now, as it happens to human beings: all the things that don't belong in consciousness; all the things that don't belong in any poem at all it don’t snow much round here no more,
but it snowed on new year’s day, a sign of what we called seasons the workshop lady said feelings lead to longings lead to action . . . i long for healthy forests, oceans, sound leadership, community, seasons . . . what to do? the seasons i have no control over -- or the past, actually. like 2020. the envelope, please . . . well, actually . . . the envelope isn’t available til jan. 16, when we’ll know if it’s the hottest year on record, or only tied meanwhile, here’s what we know about 2020: hottest temperature ever measured on planet earth (130 f, death valley, 8/16) hottest summer ever in n. hemisphere hottest jan. on record hottest sept. on record tie for hottest may on record hottest earth in 50m years (hard to imagine w/snow on th’ground -- what would donald say?) no snow in helsinki (1st recorded instance) and 4.17” rain in tucson (least ever) worst wildfires in australia’s records, 46,000,000 acres incinerated; worst in america’s, too, 10,250,000 acres scorched, including 5 of 6 worse wildfires in california ever, where 4.1 m acres burned, thick smoke smeared skies for hundreds of miles, carbonized forests; record wildfires in siberia, 247,000 acres sacrificed to flames, while record arctic heat, too (100.4 f); massive out-of-control fires in s. america, incl. pantanal wetlands, 28% consumed what is your longing, right about now? worst atlantic storm season, 30 named, 6 major hurricanes; honduras, nicaragua, guatemala “ravaged” with “staggering damage,” submerged or ruined by back-to-back cyclones (& lake charles, louisiana, too); costliest “thunderstorm” in u.s. history: $7.5b derecho (“inland hurricane”) scoured iowa meanwhile we had other things to worry about like covid, like elections, like economy, brownshirts, etc. meanwhile the “indian ocean dipole” meant: e. africa, s. & w. asia, australia pummeled by relentless inundations (too many to recap here — just scan the spring and summer staves of this here chronicle for all the local disasters & record thisses and thats): ⅓ bangladesh underwater + much of india + philipines = 6m humans displaced; 1m humans displaced in s. sudan; plus vietnam, indonesia, multiple times: monsoons went on and on; followed by plagues of locusts (ongoing), eating all the people food in east africa, much of mideast & india & o yeah strongest tropical cyclone ever to make landfall (in philipines: goni, 195 mph winds); 190 mph winds w/cyclone amphan, worst ever to hit bay of bengal; worst ever to hit horn of africa (gati) (the seawater gets hotter and hotter, which lends itself to this sort of thing) while floods in china cost $32b with a “b” — cities inundated all up and down the yangtze much deluge there, but little rain in zimbabwe, madagascar, w. cape, s. cone, dry corridor of c. america: busted farms, hungry kids, parents ready for drastic change lowest arctic sea ice ever in july, october; zombie storms in pacific; greening arctic w/methane blow-holes; massive trans-atlantic dust cloud . . . co2 emissions went down and down; co2 concentrations continued up up up the point of all of which is this is really happening, weren’t not in the future; the point is it ain’t no hoax & ain’t no joke; the point is you had to find out about all this from a poem; the point is it isn’t stopping for 2021; the point is somebody’s got to say it. the point is you & you will do what you do. |
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June 2021
Kristin Prevallet Author/Editor
I'm a writer & teacher in Lawrence, Kansas who actually believes the scientists. I wrote a book of poems called Of Some Sky that seems to have something to do with all this. |