Part 3 Climate (In-)Justice
“See the halibuts and the sturgeons
Being wiped out by detergeons.
Fish gotta swim and birds gotta fly,
But they don’t last long if they try.
Pollution, pollution!
You can use the latest toothpaste,
And then rinse your mouth
With industrial waste..”
Rae Armantrout
Choices
Images by Toni Simon
Toni Simon, “Climate Change,” pen & ink
That Nature Valley Bars
are baked by migrant kids
on night shifts
in Grand Rapids,
for instance,
is perfectly awful
as are birds raining down
dead from heat exhaustion,
dead from avian flu—
not that it’s a contest,
but if you had to choose
*
Mind a wraith;
body a deflated
doll.
Or was it
the other way around?
There’s nothing so perfect
as the perfect substitute.