Elements of Humanity

Earth: bone like rock and flesh like clay
Water: cooling refreshment and cleansing spray
Air: warm, inspiring breath denies cold, despairing death
Fire: flaming spirit enlightens ordinary day

Elements of Trees

Earth: land’s mineral fertility
Water: dihydrogen monoxide’s nutritive quality
Air: carbon dioxide’s constructive property
Fire: photon’s creative energy

Elements of Peace

Earth: soil's fecund nurturations
Water: stream's gentle murmurations
Air: pine's whispering susurrations
Fire: star's twinkling shimmerations

Spoken Like Poetry
(1 of 4)

Spoken by Teri:

We can’t live without water.
In Kentucky we live in a forest with forty to fifty inches of rainfall a year,
And can’t get a clean drink of water.
That’s a sad story.

And to think we have allowed one industry
-One industry-
To take it away from us.

You cannot continue to destroy the most diverse hardwood forests in the world,
Leaving deserts on top of these mountain ranges,
And expect to have water for the southeastern part of the United States.

You can live without coal.

You can live without oil.

You can live without gas.

But you cannot live without water.


This material originally appeared in Plundering Appalachia: The Tragedy of Mountaintop-Removal Coal Mining. The book was edited by Tom Butler and George Wuerther and it was published by Earth Aware Editions in 2009. The material was printed as a transcript of a spoken interview. I copied the transcript verbatim then I edited it by simply changing the sentences in paragraphs to lines in a “poem”.

Emerald

Ol’ Man River

Ol’ Man River, so deep, so wide.
Your channel holds your soul inside.
Your rolling water, so dark, so slow.
Is this the way your thoughts now flow?

Perhaps the night inspires a dream
Of days of being just a stream.
Can you recall your droplet birth?
Your start outside the mother earth?
You then became a bubbling spring
And nature heard you laugh and sing.
You leapt and played like other rills
And tumbled down majestic hills.
So bright and clear your sparkling spills
Like happy kids or champagne thrills.

You disregard your history
Inside your staid maturity?
Perhaps you ponder mystery
Or maybe future certainty.
Do you expect decreasing speed
Or in the present give no heed
That freshness might soon turn to salt?

You cannot win against assault.
Relentless nature’s gravity
Convert’s “Ol’ Man” into the sea.

Copyright (c) 2009

eMeRaLD Effect Enterprises