2/27/2008

Dongjing

.
writing from down
the sink,

where "elevated
levels of ammonia,
nitrogen, and permanganate, a
chemical
used in metal cleaning,
tanning

and bleaching"

has the waterworks churning red
the flowing foamy
Han tributary
turning to ruby
ink

industrial wasteland
pumping the bloodflow
into the Dongjing
like Sanzu, like the Styx

200,000
in Hubei province
fallen short with
nothing
left
to
drink

***

writing from up
the waterworks

where Emerald City's
Department of Water

municipal water
is prize winning water
water to grace your tap
in L.A.

"Take Back the Tap" they say,
less plastic waste that way,

call a green rainbow so
rivers could all go
recover their old
transparent non-
colors

5 comments:

Crafty Green Poet said...

its appalling how polluted our waters are, across the world

writerwoman said...

Is this a Found poem? Where you get the lines from other literacture. I love those. Its interesting to see others words weaved into your work.

Dániel Dányi said...

re: Found poem, no, the "quoted" lines aren't from literature, they're mostly from news articles, but the idea is similar: the links lead to source texts.

writerwoman said...

That's really an interesting way to create a poem.

Dániel Dányi said...

:) that's the idea for the whole Poet's News blog... and as far as I know, nobody else is blogging this way.