ENVIRONMENTAL POEMS by John Pemberton

ECOLOGISTS

2009-05-14T11:17:00.000-07:00

Ecologists mooted a new profession
That showed our leaders a greener direction.

GREEN PLANNING

2009-01-17T09:46:00.001-08:00

Green fingers alone can’t rescue the planet:
We need a green plan, and us all to man it.

FARMERS

2008-11-16T10:24:00.000-08:00

They feed the soil with chemical dressings,
Which starve the land of natural blessings.

ENGLAND'S BEAUTY

2008-07-17T10:03:00.000-07:00

England’s beauty once ranged from coast to coast;
Now, that’s an ever-diminishing boast.

BEGGAR'S GOLD

2008-04-18T10:07:00.000-07:00

Beside the jeweller’s, a beggar sees arrive
A limousine manoeuvring towards the door.
Most men of leaner means, he thinks, would drive
A car with possibly four seats, no more,
-
While Mr Big’s must boast thrice those, to his disgrace.
And, on that reckoning, two-thirds of all
His worldly goods must register as waste:
A state not only mendicants deplore.
-
But wait! Through chauffered door he steps outside,
Revealing his identity as he
Who, crassly careless of our countryside,
Allows his acrid-belching factory
-
To spread pollution through the air we breathe.
Now recognised, the profligate becomes
A target for the beggar to relieve
Of that excess to which he oft succumbs.
-
The post of handyman he duly fills
- Convincing tales the plutocrat is told -
‘Recycle things not used’, he firm instils:
Thus lets his waste become the beggar’s gold!

JET PROPULSION

2008-04-16T09:42:00.000-07:00

While science delivers, through jet propulsion,
Its criminal loads of lethal pollution,
Requesting science to find a solution
Equates to reversing nuclear fusion!
It’s down to earth’s nations, without exclusion,
To toughen their laws with fierce resolution.

ONE DAY

2008-04-06T10:16:00.000-07:00

One youthful day I wandered by

The woods and fields and riverside

To chorusing of varied birds.

One later day I went by single-decker bus

To see an early bird-reserve - no fee

For listening to warblers sing away.

One future day I'll have to book, and park

And queue, and pay

To watch and hear a song-thrush sing.

One fateful day there'll be no birds

That sing - or hop, or fly:

We will have lost them, by and by.

WARNINGS

2008-04-06T10:04:00.000-07:00

Complacent bins of fruit and veg announce

Their derivation from organic farms,

Presumably to quell our prompted qualms

And subtly hint the rest we ought renounce.

Bright green, a sticker on the carton's top

Proclaims, in liquid-like typography,

Of GM blight each lactic drop is free,

Suggesting every other litre's not!

For moral turpitude we must indict:

Our plight requires a shift of attitudes.

Flaunt not as beneficial attributes

The very things that should be ours of right.

Reveal, for all to see, the hidden harms

Released by crops from sprayed, denatured fields,

By cattle-feed that daunting ills conceal,

And processed foods that ring such dire alarms.

What value do they set on human lives

Who fail to mark their noxious merchandise?

---

See also Noxious Merchandise in Bitesize Poems Extra

MORTALITY

2008-04-06T09:53:00.000-07:00

Should idiots exterminate

Our busy friends who pollinate

The shrubs and trees for fruits to bear,

Their deed would reach beyond repair.

Such loss would reap dire consequence

For human life. There's no redress:

Insecticide and pesticide

Are other names for suicide.

MINITRAM

2008-04-06T09:52:00.000-07:00

Large carbon footprints mass-transport must damn:
Except for the minimal Minitram.

INVASION

2008-04-06T09:49:00.000-07:00

Ignoring former organic traditions,
Agronomists now, with few inhibitions,
Invade the pure earth with lethal additions.

GREENHOUSE GASSES

2008-04-06T09:47:00.000-07:00

Is all this tattle of greenhouse gasses
Just a hustle to rattle the masses?

EURO FRUIT

2008-04-06T09:42:00.000-07:00

Displaying 'EU' on cartons of fruit
Could fairly be deemed a shify pursuit.
Our native concern, we're right to express:
Their carbon footprint we cannot assess.

CARBON JET

2008-04-06T09:39:00.000-07:00

It speeds near space

To flee disgrace;

But, like the snail,

It leaves a trail.

BABY'S LOT

2008-04-06T09:35:00.000-07:00

A pushchair baby sees where she's going,

Smiling at people, mummy unknowing.

Soon at the crossing, vehicles slowing,

Baby's inhaling, exhaust pipes blowing.

WESSEX

2008-04-03T04:14:00.000-07:00

Each spring to Dorset he would wend

His way, so full of gladness, yet

Anticipating round each bend

Some detriment he'd not forget.

What cause might such foreboding stir?

What ills had other landscapes borne

To which his heart would now refer

As recollections fraught, forlorn?

So low his spirits fell that day:

Old cottages of Cotswold stone

He saw to roads had yielded way,

For which no planner would atone.

Such sorrow overcame him when

Rich Warwick blossom-hedges, haunt

Of insect, vole and tiny wren,

Were rooted up, all pleas ignored.

In dark despond he'd found the heath,

Where Cheshire friends and he had played,

All cars with concrete underneath

And, on their windows, tags displayed.

In welcome contrast, Wessex wold

Retained the character and air

Of which the writer Hardy told

In prose and verse for all to share.

I MISS

2008-04-03T03:33:00.000-07:00

I miss the wholesome face of Cheshire's plain:

Dense, spiky hedges, clamber stiles, and gates

Five-barred that cattle, black-and white, constrained;

Tied stooks of corn, and hayricks high as space.

Old well-respected farming ways had meant

The patchwork of our countryside possessed

A range of fallow fields and crops that lent

Sufficient habitats for creatures' nests.

When young, I knew where otters played and bred;

Where crested newts and natterjacks were found;

Pale fields where partridges and corncrakes fed;

And places stripy badgers nosed around.

I miss the age in which they all began,

My endless cycle-rides in Cheshire's lanes

That saw me grow from boyhood state to man,

Grim wartime years replaced by peaceful days.

Alas, pollution's plague has laid its trail,

An ill, in may forms, we can't forfend,

Like chemicals, sprayed reckless 'cross the vale,

And smoke from choking cars round every bend.

It's clear what's needed is another war,

Not now of arms but one of votes that roar

Our message through the politicians' door:

To rid our food and air of things impure.

See also Pollution in Bitesize Poems Extra