VILLANGHAZALLE WITH FAUNA

by Esther Greenleaf Murer

    Do not sink gently into fathomless grief
    at brilliancy of colors bleached to white;
    rage, rage against the dying of the coral reef.
 
elkhorn, staghorn, pineapple, red cauliflower, mushroom, precious red, blue, organpipe, star, brain, torch, cup, sun, bubble, cactus, column, finger, flowerpot, pillar, table, tube, stone, fire

    Before we've even plumbed the trove of life
    that shelters there, prey to manmade blight,
    we rampage, rampage, killing off the coral reef.

purple stovepipe sponge, striped cleaner wrasse, batwing coral crab, slipper sea cucumber, tomato clownfish, yellow nudibranch, magnificent feather duster, nurse shark, marine iguana

    At last we claim the ocean as our fief;
    ours is the absolute, God-given right
    to wage, wage war against the coral reef.

blue spotted sting ray, saddleback butterflyfish, sea whip, chambered nautilus, variable boring sponge, regal tang, purple sea urchin, olive ridley sea turtle, acropora crab, sharpnosed puffer

    When Gaia bore us, she produced a thief
    who, armed with outsize trawls and dynamite,
    would stage, stage the dying of the coral reef.

harlequin shrimp, reticulate brittle star, somber sweetlips, blue-ringed octopus, loggerhead turtle, minifin parrotfish, brown volcano carpet sponge, orange fireworm, flamingo tongue cowrie

    our legacies (and may our time be brief)
    of plastic scum and seas acidified
    presage, presage the dying of the coral reef.

deceiver fangblenny, chicken liver sponge, Christmas tree worm, yellow-bellied sea snake, zebra shark, flying gurnard, sunflower starfish, leafy sea dragon, spiny lobster, zooxanthellae

    The news continues dire, with no relief,
    no end to blind rapacity in sight.
    Do not sink gently into fathomless grief
    but rage, rage against the killing of the coral reef.


Esther Greenleaf Murer is a relic of the 20th century.  She was brought up on Thornton Burgess's Seashore Book for Children and has a lifelong interest in invertebrate paleontology. 

A HEARTBEAT DISCOVERED

by David Chorlton

Hyalinobatrachium dianae

         

A frog nobody knew existed
appeared among the raindrops
in the foothills sloping down
toward the Caribbean.
It had been there all along,
as the Golden toad was dying,
as the Harlequin toad was losing
its forest, and while ultraviolet light
washed into the brightly
colored skins of tree frogs
and dart frogs, any one of which
would barely register
on the scale that weighs losses
until it becomes the last
and its call no longer
brings the nights to life.
The glassfrog is an inch of green
when it wraps its toes around
a narrow stem, and seen
from underneath, its heart
is visible through the transparent
skin, transmitting a signal back
up to the stars.


David Chorlton was born in Austria, grew up in Manchester, England, and lived for several years in Vienna before moving to Phoenix in 1978. In September, 2015, he will participate as a poet in the Fires of Change exhibition at the Coconino Center for the Arts in Flagstaff (Sponsored by the Southwest Fire Science Consortium, the Landscape Conservation Initiative, and the National Endowment for the Arts.)

WARNING FROM THE NORTH

by Kit Zak

Earth Day is April 22

 
Even before the shaman’s words, we knew
gulls screeched warning
water sipping the shore
the full moon, our lone night’s light, swollen tides
Newtok’s first six huts poised to surrender before the others.

Even before the Anchorage experts, we knew
Permafrost melt killing birds and fish,
winter ice, barrier against flood, icebox for our food
lifeline” for seals and polar bears—vanishing
ancestors’ dreams rippling in our sleep.
         
Even before the tribal grapevine,
we marked the tide, knew it was coming.
Heard about our brother whales’ distress
Denali sheep and wolves starving
lakes drained and trees burning.

Even before the talk of moving, we knew
millions to resettle one hundred tribes
and time galloping, winter winds walloping, huts sinking—
we knew.


Kit Zak lives in Lewes, Delaware, where she observes with disbelief the failure of the politicians to take up the issue of climate change. Her most recent poems are forthcoming in California Quarterly,
Portage, Poet Lore, and  The Albatross.

KEEPING VIGIL

by Emily Strauss


Earth Day is April 22

Today I saw a photo
of deep-winter Alaska
with brown dirt exposed
in the sledding track

and a fissure in the ice
of Antarctica long enough
to calve an massive ice floe
the size of Tahitian Peleliu

where the broken bones
of Japanese soldiers
were found in dark caves
seventy years later

sardines on the Oregon
coast are decimated
by over-fishing, ninety
percent are gone now

a single almond needs
a gallon of water to grow
times a million acres
the land now shriveled

another photo reveals
a twelve-foot python
imported to the Everglades
feeding on raccoons

ignorant of the threat
of a Burmese invader
part of the billion-dollar
exotic pet trade nearby

the air pollution meter
today read 168, only
unhealthy— increased
aggravation of heart, lungs

premature mortality
in the elderly forecast
for those regularly exposed
stay indoors, watch TV

I watched the sky striated
with clouds at sunset tonight,
streaked with corals, reds
coloring us over, keeping vigil


Emily Strauss is a teacher, newspaper reader, concerned citizen, and yes denizen of many poetry pages.