po’in’ down rain --
reminds me of winter in n. calif.: nonstop torrents: but this is n.e. ks.; & this is how it rains here now, & the back- yard always turns into a lake; more rain tonite, maybe a tornado or 2; while in s.w. ks., extreme fire warnings blare over the radio -- dry + windy = danger- ous for spring burning! but here it is 62 f, set to go to 77 today; then 29 tonite then 39 for hi tomorrow -- it’s damn near like the stock market . . . (“normals”? ha! — but, ok: statistically, 58/33) f.b. post: “now that nature has got our attention, what are we going to do?” it turns out that if you cut down a forest, the bats that lived there disperse, go looking for food, shit in the wild animal food market, trans- mit their diseases to the wild animals & folks who eat them transmit it to those who don’t . . . but “people only have the mental bandwidth for one life-threatening, world- altering crisis at a time” sez grist mag; & these ones show us how little numbers matter a lot: the difference, between 0.1% and 1.0% = 34k & 2.2m dead (at worst); 1.5˚ c vs. 2 c? worldwide? 13% ↑ people in heatwaves; 61% ↑ in severe drought; (& there are already a lot there already); & o yeah, no more coral; etc. is anybody reporting climate news right now? well, it’s still happening; 1st the good news: no rain of blood hail of fire 3-day darkness; but passover’s coming up & as for the other plagues. . . well, ~ a gazillion locusts in ethiopia, somalia, kenya, “an unprecedented threat to food security and livelihoods at the beginning of the upcoming cropping season” (this thanks to unnaturally heavy rains in mideast & e. africa this winter); only the seedcorn left in ‘stralia — farm country hit by drought + wildfire (+ panic buying); $63m & 20 lives lost last wk in egypt from “dragon front” (5x normal rainfall); 1st ever wind warning in seoul (21 m / sec.); record rainfall in hawai’i (+ tornado warnings — !!); warmest-ever winter in spain; sooooooo . . . what are we going to do? if u hunker down, down, down (how lo can u go?) — if we stop doing what we’ve been doing, we cld have net emissions of zero point zero zero . . . until things go back to normal again
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The sudden shift to on-line-only education across the U.S. and much of the world has got me to thinking about how physical and economic disasters might re-shape of literature & literary production in industrialized societies. As I’ve speculated before, in these digital pages, the COVID-19 disaster may serve as a time-lapse, sped-up preview and dress rehearsal for climate catastrophe, albeit in a very limited way. And among other effects, climate chaos is increasingly disrupting travel — meaning more time staying put.
Is literature’s function in our lives as a medium for — or substitute for — face-to-face human interaction? The growth in book clubs in recent years (some of which don’t discuss books) suggests that the answer may be yes. And the growth in the creative-writing industry, most of which involves face-to-face conversation, also seems like a sort of community built (ostensibly) around writing and evaluation. Then there are the festivals, conferences, book fairs, etc. — not to mention everyday one-on-one interactions between authors or between booksellers and readers. All of that is, for the moment, gone. Instead, we have “virtuality” — the world through a box. The virtual world is largely taken to be an impoverished, bloodless proxy for the real one. But I’ve done a lot of very valuable reading, listening, watching, talking about literature online. Indeed, I think my literary life would be impoverished without it. And isn’t writing a form of virtuality? Maybe you’re reading The Trial, but you definitely don’t have Kafka there to tell you what it means. Even if an author leaves behind journals, interviews or essays about their work, that’s really just more of their work — texts upon texts. Back in “The Day,” the only contact most authors had with one another was by “snail mail.” And many of their letters lament the absence of the actual correspondent. Thomas Higginson’s famous account of his one and only visit with his pen-pal Emily Dickinson is famous because of their correspondence — and her poems, of course. And the account is Higginson’s virtual presence representing Dickinson’s. Jesus ascended into the clouds but left his Book behind. Still, in a culture like that of the Midwestern U.S., where diffidence is considered a virtue, nonverbal communication is very important. The student who looks like they’re on the verge of speech, but needs an invitation to speak out; a look of real astonishment; a look of real sullenness; a hesitation here or there — these phenomena are important to a pedagogue. Is the person being fulsome and polite — or are they impressed, in spite of themself? Likewise, there’s nothing like an audience at a reading to give one a sense of whether a work is connecting — and if so, with what kind of audience. For my part, I’m just keeping the courses on life support, hoping for a better day. I asked my workshop students whether they wanted to meet at our regular time via the Zoom teleconferencing system or simply use the Discussion Board function on Blackboard. The only definite preferences expressed were in favor of the latter. So, we will exist for one another as pure text, for the nonce. That preference may be a matter of just not wanting to hassle with setting up a Zoom account; or not wanting to have to schedule anything, even virtually; or not wanting to take the tape off their cameras. But writers tend to be introverts, and I expect a lot of non-writer readers are, too; and for introverts, the present state of affairs is not so much of a hardship as for others. Indeed, this period may be just the kind of restful stock-taking that can engender writing — and leave more time for reading. And most folks still have a modicum of medical care, food, shelter, electricity, connectivity. In that respect, these are the good old days. “the luck of the irish” --
a phrase so ironic it could only have been coined by an irish person . . . but the brazillians get it: 150 killed this yr in floods & landslides (aguas de marco, indeed); global heating “contribues” to more “x-treme rainfall events” scientists say; could be the new normal, they say; survivor sez: “you couldn’t see anything, just earth and mud, just hearing cries, people crying, not knowing what to do. there was no light, there was nothing.” which kind of sums up how the climate crisis feels . . . the javanese get it: 316 homes submerged (glug, glug, glug) — worse than the rains in jan. zimbabweans get it: 1000s still camping out in leaky tents, a year after idai + kenneth (“we are always on edge, careful about our security because there are so many thieves here” — this is what it’s like, life in climate catastrophe) iranians get it bad: billions of hungry locusts, bred by abnormally wet winter, muscle out the cornoavirus on front pages thai people get it — or don’t, if it’s rice: highest prices since 2013 (paddies drying up + people hoarding) the luck of the lucky scots = bookies setting odds on the hottest spring on record at 5/4 but maybe the english are getting theirs, too: “climate change means that without radical action many more years of flood and drought crises lie ahead” (last year brought drought and floods like mad) & this winter in the northern hemisphere warmest on record: 6 f > normal in europe; “there is no normal now,” the climate scientist sez; the “spring leaf index anomaly” creeps up the u.s. map as verdant vernal temps come 20 days early; in s.e., record early spring bloom — nice, but contra naturam, ‘cuz the bears wake up too soon ’n flowers bloom too soon when we know very well winter is coming again To my sorrow, I’ve been writing poems
the entirety of my writing life on the collapse of language-- I camouflage my subversions under theories of poetics responding to colonialism replacing my mother tongue with English: Thus, I fashionably cited surrealism, abstraction, the collage of found texts… to remain stubborn against narrative for the anguish inflicted by invaders, the latest being China who literally exports truck loads of earth from Philippine land to create false islands for gambling dens atop an oceanic territory it stripped of fish and polluted with exported waste (perhaps in exchange for decades of receiving shipping fleets of the world’s garbage)-- Now, as the Corona virus spreads-- Corona offers $10 million to rename it “Bud Light Virus”-- I grieve again over the poem’s power to foretell, to gather what stains the air until it alchemizes into the clarity of blown-up, detailed scenes gleaned through the polished lens of a psychological microscope-- I fold into a fetal position against my new mattress of toilet paper rolls speechless like a baby who cannot communicate except for the presence or absence of tears. Photographs reveal that the image of a dried tear shows similar passages of erosion as have etched earth for years. “Amazing how the patterns of nature seem so similar, regardless of scale,” notes the photographer Rose-Lynn Fisher. Anguish begets the same images of branched crystals whether from dried tears that formed in moments or from the consistent deterioration of a terrain over prolonged passages of time “as though each tear is a microcosm of collective human experience, like one drop of an ocean,” says Fisher. If a poet presents Fisher’s observation to you, Reader, unmitigated by “art,” is the poem more effective? Any fetal position I undertake is metaphorical-- should I forego metaphor as if language suffices? I still want to know though now I know I will never overcome N.B.: References to Rose-Lynn Fisher from “The Microscopic Structures of Dried Human Tears” by Joseph Stromberg, Smithsonian Magazine, Nov. 19, 2013 _______________________________________________ Eileen R. Tabios has released about 60 collections of poetry, fiction, essays, and experimental biographies from publishers in ten countries and cyberspace. Most recently, she released a short story collection, PAGPAG: The Dictator’s Aftermath in the Diaspora and a poetry collection, The In(ter)vention of the Hay(na)ku: Selected Tercets 1996-2019. Her writing and editing works have received recognition through awards, grants and residencies. More information is available at http://eileenrtabios.com Stay tuned tomorrow for an extra-special guest-post by the multi-talented Eileen R. Tabios: "A POETICS OUT OF TIME, MARCH 2020." See you then!
A very valuable discussion in HuffPo with 8 experts in various fields related to climate science/crisis/psychology. The net-net?:
"Coronavirus is a simple, scary threat — and we’re not the villain." [whereas we humans have at least a little to do with climate change] "Climate change is too complex. People struggle to see the impacts." [unlike a rapidly-moving pandemic that is killing people near you] "People see climate change as an 'over there' and 'future' problem. [this is how they used to think about epidemics, too, of course] "We pay attention when there’s a disaster and then we move on." [which is what will happen with the virus – eventually – but not the climate crisis, from which there is no “moving on”] "People care more about their health than the climate, even though climate change is a health threat." [ouch] "The coronavirus can set a very real example for climate change." [“The sooner you act, the more chance you have of surviving.”] Check in with WOOT on Monday March 16 for "A POETICS OUT OF TIME, MARCH 2020," a poem by Eileen Tabios. Looking forward to it!
travel from europe stopped;
classes on-line; massive cities on lockdown . . . another reminder the world is run by people in the same high risk group . . . also a low-risk group for the worst of climate catastrophe -- viz., those who won’t be around for it: another re- minder of why there’s no action on the climate crisis . . . 36 coronavirus deaths is u.s. so far; 46 flooding deaths in n.w. pakistan, so far; ≥ 5 in egypt: “heaviest rains in recent memory” + 50 mph winds, “towering walls of dust” in u.s., dow ↓ 2352 points; mozambique ↓ 1.7 m acres of productive cropland; 100k in resettlement camps as of dec.; food aid to everyone else halved due to shortages — this, a year after cyclone idai . . . (make of all this what you will) est. 22 m displaced in 2019 from x-treme weather; world hunger ↑ after “decade of steady decline,” largely from x-treme weather; & the last 5 years officially the hottest on record -- sure, but what about the last five days?? that’s what we really care about . . . “i’m very struck,” sez another x-treme weather watcher, “by how slow the climate- related news has been these past few days. i am wondering if news agencies are so busy reporting on the coronavirus that extreme weather events are going unreported.” but british dude -- don’t be insensitive -- you don’t get it -- the ncaa tournament is cancelled — cancelled! and they’re not waiting til “the end of the century” for that . . . Well, the institution where I teach has finally pulled the plug on in-person classes, indefinitely. My only creative-writing class this semester is one small workshop; I’ve given them the option of meeting via Zoom or the more mechanical, bloodless option of just posting comments about one another’s poems on Blackboard. I hope they choose the former — they’re a good group, and I like meeting with them a couple of times a week. But they’re going to have to be on board with the idea if it’s going to work on line.
As I’ve said before — and I’m not the only one — this coronavirus scare seems like a time-lapse rehearsal for the climate crisis. Especially the “scare” part — fear’s a big motivator, as we’re seeing. And as I’ve also said, climate chaos is going to mean a re-think of how we teach and publish. I expect both activities to migrate more and more to the virtual world, at least while it’s still an option. (I just joined a Facebook group devoted to on-line creative-writing pedagogy.) In a way, this is an introvert’s dream come true, so I’m not that bothered by the precautions. It probably will create more opportunity for reading and writing, as well. And less travel and industrial energy production — hence lower emissions of CO2 & other grungy pollutants (that kill more people than this virus probably will). But there is a danger that we will become more isolated from one another, even to an unhealthy degree. Tocqueville pointed out the political danger of social atomization for a democracy — viz., the divided are easier to conquer by a would-be autocrat. For all I know, that may be transpiring before our eyes. As socially marginal as literature is in the U.S., it does occasionally bring people together — at schools, libraries, book clubs, readings, etc. And (as Tocqueville also pointed out), interactions within civil society form a network that can be a backstop against autocracy. Those kind of communities and social interactions often become the infrastructure of political resistance. And they’ve gone by the boards in recent decades (the “Bowling Alone” phenomenon) — more so since social media has taken over our lives. Facebook and Instagram can help ignite social movements; but they can also be used to quash, fragment, or selectively enflame them (as the Russians have shown us). I expect climate breakdown to limit travel in future — for financial reasons, if nothing else. So, the restriction of intra-country travel in China and Italy, or of international travel to the U.S., may be a trial run for what will happen (perforce) in a climate-contracted world. At any rate, it’s a taste of what massive disruption of daily life looks like. And if you think this is bad . . . It also may be an opportunity to re-think the way we as writers and teachers of writing do business, in the era of climate collapse. In that case, if we survive the virus, there might be a silver lining to this particular cloud. “strangely enough,
i think the death toll of the coronavirus at the end of the day may be positive, if you consider the deaths from atmospheric pollution lockdowns are preventing,” sez the french think-tank dude — meaning the 7 m dead of pollution yearly > probable virus deaths (so so insensitive to say); “why are we so much more afraid of the coronavirus than climate change? what is so special abt the coronavirus that we are ready to put the world on lockdown b/c of that?” (ok, that’s it! — get him out of here!) but uh oh -- here comes u.n. head guterres: viral infections eventually slow down, but not the climate crisis, “the defining challenge of our times” for decades to come; & u.n. chief weatherman adds climate threat “is greater to our species than any virus” we need a manhattan- project-type push to find a vaccination against climate change, what i say! i mean, sure this winter proved to be the warmest ever in europe, but feb. turned out to be only the second-warmest on record, next to 2016, only 4 yrs ago, which proves we’ll always have 10 yrs to save earth! meanwhile 65 flood warnings in u.k. -- they built more barriers along the sylvan wye to keep it from washing towns away in already-flooded areas (while the p.m. tries to focus their attention on viruses): 300,000 affected by ongoing drought in sri lanka; & in uruguay, govt. declares state of emergency in 5 departments due to drought (“6 meses sin lluvia”); record wet winter in alabama; & graveyards in canada’s n.w. territories are melting; other than that, & all the other deadly disasters readers of this chronicle are familiar with from past weeks (most of which continue or people are still cleaning up after), only the arctic, animals, the past & future are left: the past: insurers dole out £360m to pay for storms ciara & dennis; “significant warming” in india from 1951-2015, “study sez”; the future: indian ocean weather patterns caused fires in australia & flooding in e. africa are likely to worsen; amazon rainforest could collapse in 50 yrs & become net carbon emitter (“new report sez”); and so on (you can read all about it in the 2019 world meteorological org report); but for now, as we re-don our surgical masks and hazmat suits, and con- vert our f2f courses to on- line, we now return to our regular programming . . . |
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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. |