Climate Change (Remove filter)
Science is Divided
The oceans rise and temperatures rocket,
But we have the answer in our pocket.
A glossy document, signed and dated –
Oh, come on, you should be elated –
In which we promise to slightly reduce
The poisonous discharges we let loose.
Not straight away, of course, you understand;
There are more pressing urgencies at hand.
Nearby, a man sinks down beneath the waves;
His ...
Wednesday 22nd November 2023 9:37 pm
COP28
The hottest year ever, again;
We’re pigging out on greenhouse gases.
COP Twenty-Eight will be here soon,
That shamefest of chancers and asses.
The leaders set themselves targets,
Then contrive to miss them by miles,
Seasoning failure with blah-blah
And their well-practiced plastic smiles.
Meanwhile, siren voices tell us:
Get out there, get out there and score!
...Sunday 12th November 2023 9:48 pm
Protestor
I block the traffic in the road;
And chain my body to railings,
To illustrate the catalogue
Of governments’ climate failings.
I march in the demonstrations,
Sit down on the Minister’s lawn,
To give some hope to the children
And those who have not yet been born.
Last month I was twice arrested,
For challenging this dirty game.
Fines and days in court are...
Saturday 21st October 2023 4:18 pm
Molten Man
I am a molten man;
My flabby, molten face
Is looking up at you
As you beam down from space.
I used to look quite nice
When common sense ruled here,
In times we did not trash
The assets of this sphere.
You visitors would see
A smart, contented Earth,
Which knew instinctively
How to respect its worth.
But sadly man has struck
And chopped and grou...
Sunday 8th October 2023 9:28 pm
wayward seasons
summer brings slurries
wicked sticky sleet drops
puddling, pooling, icicles dripping
slush gushes from the frosted rooftops
winter heat fries the egg
cracked on rocky road
melting the cream
burning the orange cone
Melbourne Falls, darkness dawns
sixty days of night
madness in the streets
kingdom of crime
Tamura Springs, sky rains cancer
the sakura flower lost
our beautiful reminder
...
Monday 2nd October 2023 8:32 pm
ReMember The Night
ReMember the Night
How can you go meekly into the night
When your world no longer gently goes around?
How can you go meekly into the night
When lives of who you cherish depend on you being wise?
Do you forget that in the beginning time started?
And yet this time has an end as so do you.
For if you have, forget not that all times have their moments besides one Holy one
...Sunday 1st October 2023 3:55 am
Faith - a poem
Faith begins on the edges of understanding
Faith begins on the edges of understanding
Let me please then fall into this abyss of source where Faith is.
A surfacing, peace filled trove glimpsed first amidst a raging wind,
its past buried deep by the residue of age old minds.
One personal confrontation, not new yet rediscovered,
Connected to the gentleness of a longed ...
Sunday 1st October 2023 3:28 am
Uxbridge
We’re all for fighting climate change,
Until the choice gets tough;
Don't try to meddle with our cars,
Our holidays, our stuff.
What beats the smell of petrol fumes,
The whiff of kerosene,
The closet full of unworn clothes,
The cinema-sized screen?
We'll stand behind the barricades
To fight off this green crap,
And watch the lifestyle we deserve
Fall stra...
Friday 21st July 2023 4:58 pm
What harms the bee, harms the hive
Judgement day comes for an apian hive
On the threshold, will it die or survive?
The Bee's priority is the unhoneyed comb
Unaware of the finality of her home,
What harms one bee, ruptures the greater whole,
Their shared destiny, the colony's goal.
The bee is the hive's cooling, beating heart.
Each tiny winged creature, a precious part,
What threatens the hive may destroy the bees
Confl...
Wednesday 14th June 2023 11:06 am
Failing the people
I’m baffled how world leaders find the nerve
to sign a pledge, then right before our eyes
fail the people they pretend to serve.
They know the price of oil but never swerve
from drilling more while greenhouse gases rise.
I’m baffled how world leaders find that nerve!
They buy the myth of endless growth, the oeuvre
of economic frauds who feed them lies,
and fail ...
Friday 9th June 2023 11:19 pm
Pause!
Flags and placards round Big Ben
say
PAUSE! PAUSE!
Shouts and chants of Waddawewant?
a
PAUSE! PAUSE!
We call a pause on oil and then
we all lie down. We stand up again.
We shout demands at Parliament
to
PAUSE! PAUSE!
No new gas! No new oil!
PAUSE! PAUSE!
One point five degrees soon gone.
PAUSE! PAUSE!
Arctic in meltdown, blood on the boil,
w...
Thursday 8th June 2023 10:44 am
Rolling down to London
Rolling down to london on a train,
the taught and shining buds
of Spring are bursting on the trees.
Wharfedale’s misted in a bluish haze,
but heaps of plastic refuse in the woods
on the drab periphery of Leeds
descend my mood from buoyancy to pain.
Rolling forwards now, the rape fields blaze
and blackthorns bloom with pearls,
resplendent in the boundary hedges
we...
Sunday 4th June 2023 8:59 pm
Tank or tailpipe?
There was a man lived down my street
who felt unease about pollution.
Ashamed to see his car excrete
bad air, he found an odd solution.
Others who had thought thus far
used bicycles, or electric cars
but my neighbour’s mate was the man who sold
the fuel his thirsty motor drank.
He was fearful this friend’s business might fold
if he stopped putting petrol in the ta...
Saturday 3rd June 2023 11:37 pm
What will you miss the most?
So when we shoot past two degrees
and all the land is toast
and skies are black from the burning trees
what will you miss the most?
Me, I’ll miss the song of birds
that welcomed in the day:
those heart-rending, incoherent words
that had so much to say.
And when the heating of the ocean
flays the coral reefs,
will you temper your emotion?
Modulate your gri...
Friday 2nd June 2023 4:17 pm
The wasted wind
The answer my friend is blowin' in the wind - Bob Dylan
What force can power the years ahead?
Now the age of oil is dead
we wait for industry to heed
the whisper of the wasted wind,
the whisper of the wasted wind.
A pivotal crisis is upon us
and ready or not we shoulder the onus.
We must make good or else be goners,
be dust dispersed by the wasted wind,
...
Friday 2nd June 2023 12:45 pm
Falling short
What hope remains while politicians skirt
around the crisis, pledging they will shut
a few polluting plants but token cuts
in fossil fuel extraction fall so short?
Sunday 28th May 2023 9:56 pm
No exit
Back when I was young I didn’t fear:
I knew the world could solve this situation.
We understood the cause, so the way out was clear:
a comprehensive pact between all nations
to stop emitting CO2
into the atmosphere.
Back then there seemed no need to march and shout,
to sit down in the road and press for truth.
We could not conceive of a climate up the spout.
In th...
Sunday 7th May 2023 8:39 pm
Today
Every gob of oil we suck today,
every turd of coal we flame resplendent,
every age-old species we erase
is assault against our own descendants.
I stoop before the few that reach tomorrow:
striving to live, I understand how they
must curse us, dodging lethal hails of arrows
we senselessly let fly today.
Saturday 6th May 2023 11:07 pm
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