Flare Stacks in Full Bloom

Flare Stacks in Full Bloom is a collection of eco-feminist poetry set in southeast Texas. This region, sometimes called “Cancer Alley,” is home to the nation’s largest oil refinery. It has also been on the front lines of climate disasters such as Hurricane Harvey, the historic flooding from Tropical Storm Imelda, and just last year, Hurricanes Laura and Delta. It’s a region that feels the tension of climate change: economically, it is dependent on the oil industry, the same industry that poisons its citizens and threatens its lands existence as sea levels rise. Flare Stacks in Full Bloom explores this tension through a chronicle of Hurricane Harvey—before, during, and after the storm, through formal poetry (sonnets, villanelles, and blank verse narratives).

from "Flare Stack Eden"

You smell it like a snake, from miles away—

this Eden made of benzene, naphthalene

and gasoline. The smokestack garden never

rests. It works through day and night, like any

forest does. It turns the blood of earth

into the fuel that makes it sing this dusk

chorus of whistles, bells, and whooshing flame.

You look up, imagining these towers

as tupelo trees that scrape the sky.

All around you, pipelines form a labyrinth,

meandering like streams for endless miles. 

 

The whistle blows like Bachman’s sparrow’s song,

beckons your return as you slip on

your work boots once again to toil through

the nightshift, promising a world of green.

Suddenly, a flare stack blooms as quickly

as a burst of evening primrose, fills

the sky with something almost beautiful

in vibrant hues of gold and cherry red.

Standing at the gate in awe, you breathe,

tasting the awful cost of paradise.