Friday, September 26, 2014

When Push Comes to Shove






a toy-sized tugboat 
bullies logs bigger than 
him into manageable batches.
Cabled, they wait to be pulled
and pushed into a pile at the mill 
where a blade sinks its savage teeth.
 Torn bark, grain and pitch fills
 cargo containers craned onto 
barge cities sitting fathoms
deep and miles high. 

China buys our oxygen. 
We sell it cheap, then buy back 
dead, wholesale consumable goods -
bankrolling some and bankrupting others.
 It pollutes their asiatic factory air 
and poisons the Puget Sound
 playground we share with 
resident orca whales. 

Ediz Hook - Port Angeles, Washington - September 2014.