The Fishies are Drowning in Oil

Like many of you, I have been sitting around absolutely helpless as a simple oil spill morphs into the largest environmental disaster this country (possibly the world) has ever seen. Honestly, there is not much to do but wait and see how quickly (if ever) they are able to stop the spillage and save the wildlife. It's a pretty bleak scene on the nightly news these days.

But, in situations like this, where there isn't a silver lining in sight, we artists must create. It is the only path to healing. Check out this awesome poem about the aftermath of the, now infamous BP spill, by Nordette Adams.

Oil
BY Nordette N. Adams

That bird don't know me.
If I met that bird
on a beach, it might christen me.
That bird might drop bombs like karma
on my head or peck my ankles with its long beak
if I cornered it, if I limited
flight.

Look at its eye!

Look at the tinge
of affliction managed.
A human closes fingers around a feathered neck,
siphons out a throat,
helping, hoping to help,
healing.

Humans.
We like making holes in the deep blue sea.
We like seeing illustrations of our compassion
in the aftermath of chaos.

We like fixing things that need to be fixed
because we like fixing problems like
our shortage of fossil
fuels.

That "bird is normally white with a yellow head"
but now it's slick. It's black,
but not cool like jazz trumpet grooves.
It's denigrated.more

Who is Nordette Adams? - an excerpt from the Examiner

Nordette Adams, who is the New Orleans Literature Examiner and also a poet and fiction writer, rarely directs readers to her own literary works; however, given the interest she's seen recently in her poem "Oil," she makes an exception today. This disaster has endangered wetlands, marine life and other wildlife, including brown pelicans, the Louisiana state bird. Adams's poem focuses on just one bird as it examines humanity's creation of more problems while seeking to solve one.

Photo by Les Stone, ibrrc