Concrete, She
Englewood, CO
2020, Senior, Poetry & Spoken Word
concrete, the modern-day amber, complete with jack and his hammer
is a preservative applied to the flesh that has died
on her sedimentary body stained by tide
she dresses in saran wrap and polyethylene clean
almost violating how all of her fish can be seen
abuse tells her she is single-use
excuse tells her she is only qualified to
seduce polyamorous polycarbon nooses
she is not what she chooses
and when the polypropylene necklaces and nylon
fly unto her wrists and she smiled on
mouth lined with braces of straw
choking on bottle caps
relax, they tell her but the
plastic tears her flesh apart
they start with a bandage adage
a layer of cement to manage
the bleeding and so they tell her
it is not her fault as they assault
her with asphalt
disinfected with her own salt
she is bandaged in cement intent
under her cuts, underneath but what
her sedimentary flesh
a mesh of a maggot hive
all four-wheel drive
alive and aligned in
black veins with yellow streaks
arteries congested with sulphur dioxide
no choice but to abide and hide her concrete skin replete
normally bodies of water bleed water
but normally bodies of daughters are not slaughtered
so normally concrete embodied bleeds oil instead
and cement lungs exhale ozone and lead
concrete, for the flesh that is dead.
Reflection
Reflection
I never truly realized how the proximity of people to the sea have cost these marine environments their diversity and habitat. The urbanization of the littoral zones that attract tourists have halved marine life diversity that is sensitive from everything ranging from sand grain size to air pollution. In California alone, 90% of beaches have been urbanized, a figure that becomes increasingly disturbing as it is realized to be linked to fish, piscivore, and planktivore populations dropping. The appearance of clean, sandy beaches is similarly artificial—cities that rake and maintain their shorelines actually deprive shorebirds and isopods of much-needed food. When researching about the problems plaguing our increasingly urbanized shores, I realized how little attention or responsibility local policymakers have given this issue. So, when writing, I was inspired by the image of the ocean as a woman unable to stop others from covering up her cuts with cement, a concrete jungle forced upon her borders. I learned so much about urbanization and our oceans that I didn't know before, but I do realize how I need to start holding myself accountable for the environmental impacts I have, but also in being able to take the same steps for awareness for policy change. I am a slam poet and I regularly compete at slams in Denver, so being able to compose and perform even more poems about the impacts we humans have in the environment is a goal I hope to achieve in the near future.