They suck up ancient creatures
that ferment beneath the sea.
They snare that ooze with cruel drills whining
through the stiff Gulf breeze.
They want to get it, and sell it, and sell it and sell it
until it’s all gone.
Now our Gulf is an Industrial Incident,
please stand back.
I know them.
They gouge Florida’s ancient dunes
then truck them east
to spread on Miami Beach,
which wasn’t a beach,
but a mangrove swamp
with hidden creatures;
a whole world in those leggy roots.
They push dry earth into the wet places,
execute minnows, frogs,
trees, and shady treasures.
They smooth it over to hide it good,
then build houses on that fake dry place,
houses sitting right next to the dry place
they dug out, and dug out, and dug out
to make it wet.
They rip ancient coral from its dark earth home,
expose fossil shadows to bright sun.
They ignore its old stories, its nooks and crannies,
as they shovel it into the crusher, the burner, the mixer.
They smooth it over to hide it good
so we can drive from here to there
so fast we don’t notice
we are crushing Florida’s bones.
—Julie Hauserman, essayist, commentator, and two-time nominee for the Pulitzer Prize
[Read more A Tribute to the Gulf Coast]
that ferment beneath the sea.
They snare that ooze with cruel drills whining
through the stiff Gulf breeze.
They want to get it, and sell it, and sell it and sell it
until it’s all gone.
Now our Gulf is an Industrial Incident,
please stand back.
I know them.
They gouge Florida’s ancient dunes
then truck them east
to spread on Miami Beach,
which wasn’t a beach,
but a mangrove swamp
with hidden creatures;
a whole world in those leggy roots.
They push dry earth into the wet places,
execute minnows, frogs,
trees, and shady treasures.
They smooth it over to hide it good,
then build houses on that fake dry place,
houses sitting right next to the dry place
they dug out, and dug out, and dug out
to make it wet.
They rip ancient coral from its dark earth home,
expose fossil shadows to bright sun.
They ignore its old stories, its nooks and crannies,
as they shovel it into the crusher, the burner, the mixer.
They smooth it over to hide it good
so we can drive from here to there
so fast we don’t notice
we are crushing Florida’s bones.
—Julie Hauserman, essayist, commentator, and two-time nominee for the Pulitzer Prize
Julie Hauserman has been writing about Florida's environment for 23 years.She was a Capitol bureau reporter for the St. Petersburg Times and an e
ssayist for National Public Radio's Weekend Edition-Sunday and The Splendid Table. Her work is featured in several Florida anthologies, including U
nspOILed, The Wild Heart of Florida (University Press of Florida, 1999), The Book of the Everglades (Milkweed, 2002), and Between Two Rivers: Stories
from the Red Hills to the Gulf (Red Hills Writers Project, 2004).
[Read more A Tribute to the Gulf Coast]
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