haiku for Burma

red
of monks' robes -
leaves fall.


Visit the Burma Campaign Website

Songs for Relinquishing the Earth by Jan Zwicky

This collection of poetry is infused with music, many of the poems being in homage to specific musical works, such as Bartok's Roumanian Dances. One of the things I most enjoyed was how music and the natural world entwine in several of the poems, these lines from K219, Adagio:

The fiddle is still maple tuned with starlight,
the bow, breath with a backbone,
sweet with sap.

That long trill
is a hand that lifts your hair
a final time, sunlight a last kiss.

The constant music running through the collection balances the sense of loss found in poems such as Brahms' Clarinet Quintet in B Minor, Op 115:

....though the earth is dying
and the names of its diseases
spread from the fencelines....


The music in these poems and in nature can help to give us hope in the face of seeming environmental catastrophe.

Songs for the Earth is published on recycled stock by Brick Books,
email brick DOT booksAT sympatico DOT ca

More Christmas Cards

More Christmas cards made from reused business folders, scrap wrapping paper and photos from magazines. The Robin is from Birds, the magazine for the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds. The polar bear is from a Greenpeace publication.

Published

I have a poem in the latest issue of Orbis magazine. This is a small magazine packed with good poetry. Carole Baldock is an excellent editor who takes great care of her writers, communicating well and sending proofs. This is pretty unusual in the UK poetry world and is to be applauded!

Therapy

This alien machine, we are told
cures the worst diseases
with glowing magic dust.

We gather reverent, in awe
scoop up the shining powder
leaking from the metal,

rub it on our bodies
watch painful sores emerge,
but we are brave and know

this suffering is our healing.


In March 1984, in Juarez, Mexico a cancer X-ray machine was sold to a scrap merchant and ended up on a rubbish dump.

(Poem previously published in Spume Magazine)

Pink in October - Environmental Factors in Breast Cancer

There are lots of factors in any disease. However, this is an environmental blog, so this post for Pink for October looks at the link between the environment and breast cancer. See this article from Breast Cancer Action for more information.

‘Known risk factors’ for breast cancer, like late menopause, having children late and family history are apparently present in only 30% of breast cancer cases.

More and more harmful chemicals are being produced and finding their way into the environment. Some chemicals, are known to act like the hormone estrogen in the body and stimulate cell growth. Many damaging chemicals are all pervasive and it would be impossible to avoid them. However you can reduce your exposure to harmful chemicals, for example:

* Eat organic food – organic food is produced without the use of pesticides, many of which have been linked with cancer

* Avoid cosmetics and toiletries that contain harmful chemicals. This document from Women’s Environmental Network draws attention to some chemicals you should avoid. I will post later this month about green toiletries that are kinder to your health and to the environment.

It is of course also important to have regular health checks to catch the disease early enough to be treated.

Pink for October

As some of you may already have noticed, Alter Ego and Bolts of Silk have gone Pink for October to raise awareness of breast cancer. Crafty Green Poet has to remain green as far as I'm concerned, but as Nia pointed out in a comment on Alter Ego, there are environmental factors in breast cancer so I thought I'd experiment with ways of incorporating pink into the overall green decor of this blog. I'll post on the topic sometime this month too.