WORDS FOR WOES
Dear Matafele Peinem
Dear Matafele Peinem,
You are a seven-month-old
Sunrise ofgummy smiles
You are bald as an egg and bald as the Buddha
You are thighs that are thunder, shrieks that are lightning
So excited for bananas, hugs
And our morning walks along the lagoon
Dear Matafele Peinem,
I want to tell you about that lagoon
That lucid, sleepy lagoon lounging against the sunrise
Men say that one day that lagoon will devour you
They say it will gnaw at the shoreline
Chew at the roots ofyour breadfruit trees
Gulp down rows ofyour seawalls
And crunch through your island’s shattered bones
They say you, your daughter
And your granddaughter, too
Will wander rootless
With only a passport to call home
Dear Matafele Peinem,
Don’t cry, Mommy promises you
No one will come and devour you
No greedy whale of a company
Sharking through political seas
No backwater bullying of businesses with broken morals
No blindfolded bureaucracies
Gonna push this mother ocean over the edge
No one’s drowning, baby
No one’s moving
No one’s losing their homeland
No one’s gonna become a climate change refugee
Or should I say no one else to
The Carteret Islanders of Papua New Guinea
And to the Taro Islanders of Fiji
I take this moment to apologize to you
We are drawing the line here because, baby
We are going to fight
Your mommy, daddy, Bubu Jimma
Your country and president too
We will all fight and even though there are
Those hidden behind platinum titles
Who like to pretend that we don’t exist
That the Marshall Islands, Tuvalu, Kiribati
Maldives and Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines
And floods of Pakistan, Algeria and Colombia
And hurricanes, tidalwaves
And earthquakes didn’t exist
Still there are those who see us
Hands reaching out
Fists raising up
Banners unfurling
Megaphones booming
And we are canoes blocking coal ships
We are the radiance of solar villages
We are the rich clean soil of the farmer’s past
We are the petitions blooming
From teenage fingertips
We are families
Biking, recycling, reusing,
Engineers dreaming, designing, building,
Artists painting, dancing, writing
We are spreading the word
And there are thousands
Out on the street marching
With signs hand in hand
Chanting for change now
They’re marching for you, baby
They’re marching for us
Because we deserve to do more than just survive
We deserve to thrive
Dear Matafele Peinem,
You are eyes heavy with drowsy weight
So just close those eyes, baby
And sleep in peace because
We won’t let you down
You’ll see
