Global War by Dawn Maxey

I was introduced to Dawn Maxey’s spoken word poetry at the recent AIGA Compost Modern event.

Here’s some excerpts from her very spirited poem, “Global War” about eco-hype:

But then/ just the other day,
I began to notice people at Whole Foods with entire shopping carts full of ‘organic’ and ‘go green’ items. These people are the same ones that say things like “did I bump into you? I’m sorry. I just didn’t expect this ENVIRONMENTALLY SAFE dishwashing soap to be so heavy.”
I want to pour environmentally safe salt in their eyes.

In fact, I imagine a day when things get so bad you’ll live in a glass house so that everyone can see you wake up in the morning, get out of your organic soy bean bed and pack your “this is not a plastic bag”, bag. You’ll open a box of Tony the tiger’s non hydrogenated hypoallergenic free trade grain flakes, and drive your not-tested-on-animals bicycle to work. Then you’ll help Nike ‘save’ the rainforest by branding large red swooshes on all the lemurs or maybe organize a photo shoot for Abercrombie’s new cotton free cotton underwear.

Green is chic now, but when the stock market of trends crashes
no one will want to be caught dead with biodegradable polos, environmentally safe dirt, or toilet paper made from corn husks.
the earth will be just as trashed as Lindsay Lohan in a Bacardi factory
and people will care
even less

So how do you fix the problem?
Make being green
sustainable
show people that it’s not hip or trendy or fun to be green
it’s an obligation