Islands
There’s an island in the Pacific
called Nauru,
over 2000 miles
from the nearest coast.
A picturesque paradise
of palm trees,
coconuts,
equatorial sunlight,
and, regrettably,
phosphate.
Sold to a strip mine in 1906
Savings squandered
on a hotel, an airline,
thousands of cars
just an island no larger than 8 square miles.
Screwed out of their fortune by a few greedy bastards on the mainland.
Nothing to show for the fact that
80 percent of paradise
now uninhabitable,
nothing more than gray limestone
and dust.
There’s an island in the Pacific
called Pinta,
600 miles off Ecuador’s coast,
in the Galapagos.
The only home to
noble, majestic
Pinta island tortoise.
They’re gone now,
starved to death,
all their food eaten
because explorers thought it was a good idea
to introduce goats to the island.
Their branch
hacked off the great evolutionary tree,
never to regrow.
There’s an island in the Pacific,
fourth largest in the world,
uninhabited.
Over 250 thousand square miles
of Kraft and Hostess and Aquafina.
An island of plastic,
The Great Pacific Garbage Patch.
Our islands are dying and nothing’s being done about it.
We’re trading our tropics for trash
And we aren’t stopping.
I know when we look out from the coast,
the ocean seems vast
and untouchable
and endless,
But I just want to remind you.
There are islands in the Pacific.
You did a really good job with line breaks and enjambment in this poem. My favorite line is "There are islands in the Pacific." Also, I like the subtlety of the message.
ReplyDeleteI really like this poem! I especially like how you introduce the garbage patch as being an island and then further describing the irony of it... My favorite line is "we're trading our tropics for trash".
ReplyDeleteI like your use of line breaks and enjambment; they emphasize the beauty of these islands and make the readers feel more attached to them. I also enjoy your use of repetition with "There's an island in the Pacific"
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed how you repeated the theme of "There's an island in the Pacific" while building on the travesties that each island has encountered. My favorite line is "Their branch
ReplyDeletehacked off the great evolutionary tree,
never to regrow" because it shows how man has artificially and selfishly destroyed many islands and the species that live on the islands.
I like the repetition of "There's an island in the Pacific" and then the many examples that follow and my favorite line is "because explorers thought it was a good idea
ReplyDeleteto introduce goats to the island." probably because when I read it, it seemed funny.
The repetition with the line "There's an island in the Pacific" is very cleverly done in the way that you finish the poem off with that very same line. It puts a lot of emphasis on the message and also contributes to the overall flow of the poem. That would probably be my favorite line, because of the way you use it to create both an introduction and an ending.
ReplyDeleteThe repetition of the line "there's an island in the Pacific" was really good and you built off of it really well. I loved the line about the evolutionary tree, I thought it was really clever and showed how the islands haven't really been affected naturally as they have been by humans.
ReplyDeleteI like how initially, there's a feeling of tranquility with the introduction of the island, then there's an abrupt shift to showing how this tranquility was destroyed. Favorite line: "A picturesque paradise
ReplyDeleteof palm trees,
coconuts,
equatorial sunlight,
and, regrettably,
phosphate."
Final line is a good way to close with its reflective nature.