almost six months
of this verse chronicle, & nothing is getting funnier! . . . esp. for indigenous folks, even on indigenous people’s day: their home- land rainforest of amazonia burned or burning; rezzes getting drier; arctic melting, caribou dying; pastoralists w/o pastures (& bahamas, where invasion began, decimated, this time by invaders’ effluents & nul effects). what does it mean to feel grateful because you’ve some- thing someone else doesn’t, or you don’t have something somebody else does have but doesn’t want? the wet: well, if you’re not in japan, consider yourself lucky: typhoon hagibis (which means “speed” in tagalog, not the scottish national dish) crashes into japan: sluicing down mountains, filling the valleys w/mud. 56 dead, 186 injured (compare to 1958 storm left 1200 dead – value of better infrastructure in climatically chaotic times); 38k evac’d; 3700 homes flooded; 138k w/o water (potable, anyway); 425k homes w/o power; 112 mph winds w/gusts of 156; record rains, 37” in 24 hrs. in hakone; 37 rivers flooded; “cars & trucks flipped like toys”; + the usual landslides, etc. – you’re probably hearing about hagibis on the real news if you’re reading this in mid-oct., 2019; but it’s funny how when hurricanes hit underdeveloped lands, you don’t hear much about them . . . it’s flooding in kenya, too: “we are at risk of contracting waterborne diseases like cholera since floods have washed away toilets” (contractors didn’t consider drainage when building roads); “most of the people sleep in the cold after their houses were destroyed by flash floods” & their cattle died of pneumonia in the heavy rains; & floods in baja calif. sur, too (“material damage”); & massive downpours in uruguay “provocaron inundaciones” in various parts of the country & meanwhile 30 in. of snow in manitoba + 62 mph winds, in early oct. (btw, i use u.s. customary units not metric to try to get through the u.s. customary culture-noggin) . . . the dry: 13 million people suffer “critical levels of hunger” in the horn of africa (worst droughts since 1981 – remember “we are the world”? i guess we’re finding out that’s true – tho some are more world than others); & australia? omg – don’t get me started on australia: queensland’s fire season earliest on record; federal & n.w.s. govts investing $1 bn in water infrastructure (hear that, washington?): the town of tenterfield in that state has 74 days water left – then it’s recycled sewage on tap; & what wld an x-treme weather chronicle be w/o its daily dose of firestorm: 100 k evac’d in l.a. where they didn’t shut off the power; 100s of homes burnt (homes meaning “houses” – nowadays home is where the arse is – wherever you lay yr hat, if you survive); & here in petit larryville feels like oct. but leaves still green; local paper’s front-page story re: couple w/a “cozy bungalow”; on the back page: indigenous in ecuador negotiate with govt. (watch out, indigenous folks! i want to say but i don't have to tell them that) over fuel subsidies: see, the rich everywhere want a monopoly on the right to pollute, the right to cheap fuel, the right to be right
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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. |