[extreme environments]

Elinor Ann Walker

What We Swallow

Fibers tremble on the edges

of honeybee wings or along

legs frilled to capture pollen—

microplastic evidence stored

by foragers & found farther

afield in the strangest places:

high mountain peaks to deep

ocean floor troughs & other

boundaries, interiors—anywhere

a fragment works its way,

is absorbed, ingested, passed

through—even human placentas

where a fetus floats, surrounded,

tethered, nourished—strangely,

even there, color clings to sampled

tissue, still pigmented. Like bright

leg of bee, its honeyed signature,

what is transported, occupies

our flesh without our awareness

like a painless splinter too small

to see, crosses barriers one way

or another, is a rainbow of what

we’ve consumed: violets, reds,

oranges, pinks, ultramarine blues—

an array of colors revealed by spectral

micro-imaging of amniotic membranes,

ghosts of common products—eye-

shadows, air fresheners, soaps—

otherwise invisible fingerpaint palette

for hands too tiny to grip a thing.

Watershed

That’s when, a woman said,

            she felt her feet float   up

behind her:

            everyone knows

water finds

            the lowest point

to run through

            and once a torrent,

there is no

            stopping it

when hills are scalped,

            stripped, topped

for mining

            storms can’t be managed

like people

            when denuded landscapes

can’t anchor

            trees, or acidic runoff

dissolves rock inside out,

            dirt, everything

ran down the hill

until her door collapsed

—what a waste

                        land

geologic maps show

as weather warms,

            routes of water

sluice

            coal country

stream flow, erosion,

            sediment

river-seeking

                        houses

are floating like boats

            on muddy

currents

                        they careen

there is nothing left

            to catch

them.

Easton Smith