Raising awareness of global concerns through a marriage of the arts.
Peggy Hale Bilbro
Alabama, USA
Day after day we hear the news: the hottest July ever; the once every thousand years flood; Canada on fire; the Gulf Stream collapsing; the fortieth day of temperatures above 110°; arctic ice melting; sea levels rising; coastal areas threatened. I don’t even know what to say. If you can’t see it, I can’t convince you with my words.
forest bathing
the smell of smoke
drifts by
Published in contemporary haibun online Issue 19:3, 2023
By Peggy Bilbro
Alabama, USA
mixed
into the chili
jalapeños
the special flavor
that gives spice to life
Our favorite Mexican restaurant. The best flautas and quesadillas, not to mention the sizzling fresh fajitas. Their margaritas weren’t the best, but the food and the servers over-rode that deficit. They were the sweetest employees who always recognized us, and loved to speak Spanish with me, as a retired Spanish teacher. Then we noticed that one by one they started disappearing. Our favorite server was no longer there to greet us. The young fellow at the cash register had disappeared. The motherly lady who always sat in the first booth and calculated all the accounts and especially loved to chat with me in Spanish was missing at our next visit. Then the flautas and fajitas just weren’t up to their usual quality. The next time we were there the teen age girl at the cash register confided in us that our state’s aggressive anti-immigrant policies had caused most of her family to flee. Her father who had established this delightful ethnic corner. Her mother who kept track of the accounts. Her brothers who were the charming waiters and excellent chefs. All had found themselves unwelcome in this city and state that they had contributed their heart and heritage to. The young lady, U.S. born, was determined to stay and finish her education though even she felt threatened. So many have fled, and we are the poorer for it.
swallows
immigrating
for them no wall
if only
we could fly
By Peggy Hale Bilbro
Alabama, USA
our sins
unto the seventh generation
we watch
the rivers run dry
and do nothing
By Željko Vojković
Vis, Croatia
By Richard Grahn
Evanston, Illinois, USA
Energy.gov lists the following resources as the primary sources of energy on Earth:
Nuclear energy, fossil energy (oil, coal and natural gas), and renewable energy (wind, solar, geothermal and hydropower).
The following are listed as clean energy (solar, wind, water, geothermal, biomass and nuclear). (I have to beg the difference where nuclear is concerned because spent fuel rods need to be stored somewhere and whenever a power plant has a disaster, the surrounding area becomes a toxic wasteland.
It’s also interesting that the fact that fossil fuels are “dirty” is conveniently omitted.
By Richard Grahn
Evanston, Illinois, USA
“I hate war as only a soldier who has lived it can, only as one who has seen its brutality, its futility, its stupidity.” Dwight D. Eisenhower.
I will add that war is distracting humanity from solving the real problems we face on this planet as a species. It is the antithesis of collaboration, something we desperately need in order to be able to share this planet in a sustainable fashion.
By Richard Grahn
Evanston, Illinois, USA
As the world’s superpowers flash their muscles, the following, chilling thought comes to mind . . .”The prospect for the human race is sombre beyond all precedent. Mankind are faced with a clear-cut alternative: either we shall all perish, or we shall have to acquire some slight degree of common sense. “Bertrand Russell, “The Bomb and Civilization” (1945)
By Richard Grahn
Evanston, Illinois, USA
“I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.”
Martin Luther King Jr.
“I have a dream” speech, August 1963
By Richard Grahn
Evanston, Illinois, USA
According to the World Food Program, ~783 million people in the world are hungry. Of those, 333 million face severe hunger and 47 million are on the brink of famine or worse. We live on a planet with finite resources. As the world population swells to over 8 billion, now more than ever, the human trait of compassion is needed. Not something easily reproduced by a machine.
By Richard Grahn
Evanston, Illinois, USA
empty parking lot—
a breath of foggy air
frosts my glasses
Today marks the first of this year’s snow. It’s been frigid enough the past week for crystals to accumulate. But autumn blankets the snow with its trademark flare—leaves falling so fast, it’s hardly a fair contest.
A child shakes her snow globe . . .
The where-I-stand-now erupts with a gale-force howl, snow and leaves rise from the pavement in painted pirouettes—here-to-there-to-here. I lean into the flurry—face frozen—this moving picture spinning me in a dance between the seasons . . .
But, quickly as the howl arises, the child falls fast asleep, her miniature world resting on the pillow beside her. In the where-I-stand-now, sky and trees resume their ways—snow and leaves drifting down, painting Earth another shade of dream.
open music box
the crunch of boots dancing
around the globe
By Richard Grahn
Evanston, Illinois, USA
I know there are stars; I have seen them at night. I have floated among them my entire life. They seem far away in these city lights. But inspired, I am, by the way they gleam. The slightest star in the dimmest dream ignites my beacon for all to see.
aurora sky . . .
the flickering treetops
of my childhood
By Richard Grahn
Evanston, Illinois, USA
Per the National Museum of Natural History, recent studies estimate that there are about 8 million species on planet earth of which about 15,000 are currently threatened with extinction. Scientist generally agree that the rate of extinctions today is many times higher than the natural extinction rate. Pollution and habitat disruptions are just two factors in this reality.
By Richard Grahn
Evanston, Illinois, USA
We really do need to be vocal about the things that matter to the future of this planet. Silence is no longer a viable path forward. Inaction is no longer tolerable. It’s time to wake up, roll out of the proverbial bed, and rouse the neighbors.
By Richard Grahn
Evanston, Illinois, USA
Antartica is dripping into the sea. The world’s largest glaciers are melting at an alarming rate. We live on an evolving planet. It’s reacting to us. The question is, what are we going to do about it?
By Richard Grahn
Evanston, Illinois, USA
Pollinator populations are declining because of habitat loss, disruptions in nesting and breeding sites due to construction, pesticides, and other factors such as climate change and pollution. These insects play a crucial role in the propagation of crops and other flora. Without them, the world would be a hungry place, indeed.
By Richard Grahn
Evanston, Illinois, USA
Despite all the doom and gloom in the planetary forecast, I like to believe there is hope the human race will see that violence and greed are detrimental to its survival and that cooperation is the only sustainable path forward.
By Richard Grahn
Evanston, Illinois, USA
I don’t know much about butterflies. I can recognize a Monarch when I see one, but other than that, they’re just nice to look at. Today a white one, with a wingspan of only about an inch and a half, was flitting around in the garden from hosta to vinca to sunflower to rose but never landing. Maybe it was looking for the best place to rest its wings. To and fro, lifted by the wind occasionally up to twenty feet or more, then zigzagging its way back to the flower bed—it seemed to be searching, but for what? Maybe it just likes to fly, enjoys the garden view. Maybe it’s safer in the air.
I have felt like that insect for most of my life, flitting around, looking for the perfect place to rest. We are different as I wear shoes; it doesn’t have holes in its socks. But we are both travelers, navigating our way through the flowerbed of life. It caught the wind; I chose the road, but now I have a roof and it has the sky. As I watched, I realized there was nothing between us but the rays of the sun.
dressed for the milonga . . .
across the dance floor, she glides,
pauses, glides again
First published in Contemporary Haibun Online 17:3