Kathy Jetnil-Kjin, cli fi poet of the world, wife of Makerusa Porotesano, delivers powerful cli fi poem to world leaders at the UNITED NATIONS today! -- [text here]

http://www.mvariety.com/regional-news/69488-world-leaders-cheer-small-island-speaker ==========UPDATE -- KATHY was joined at the podium by her husband, Makerusa Porotesano, with their baby daughter, Matafele, in his arms. =============================

 

dear matafele peinam, you are a seven month old sunrise of gummy smiles

you are bald as an egg and bald as the buddha

you are thunder thighs and lightning shrieks so excited for bananas, hugs and our morning walks past the lagoon

dear matafele peinam, i want to tell you about that lagoon that lucid, sleepy lagoon lounging against the sunrise

some men say that one day that lagoon will devour you they say it will gnaw at the shoreline chew at the roots of your breadfruit trees gulp down rows of your seawalls and crunch 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 peinam, 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 all the hurricanes, earthquakes, and tidalwaves 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 villageswe are the rich clean soil of the farmer’s past

we are 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 t

hey’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 peinam, your 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 -

See more at:

http://www.rtcc.org/2014/09/23/marshall-islands-poet-we-deserve-to-do-more-than-just-survive/#sthash.yXJoYveO.dpuf