Poems for the Parks

inkinthebranches

1 year ago

Three Pantoums for March 1, 2025

“Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.”

-Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Pantoum for Park Rangers
 
Who knew it would become so hard? 
This desire to protect our most special places.
To inform, explain, research, guard
our wild, beautiful, untamed spaces.

This desire to protect our most special places
lives in the deepest chamber of our heart.
Our wild, beautiful, untamed spaces
call us caregivers to do our part.

Living in the deepest chamber of our heart
is an undimmable spark
calling us caregivers to do our part
to celebrate and serve our National Parks.

The mission of all park rangers
to inform, explain, research, and guard,
is threatened and in danger.
Who know it would become so hard?

Copyright Adrienne S. Wallner/Jaeger

Flowers for Federal Workers

A beautiful, bulging bouquet of flowers,
the valentine you never got.
An offering of appreciation to empower,
a balm for the chaos that’s been wrought.

The valentine you never got
is validation of your importance and worth.
A balm for the chaos that’s been wrought,
each blossom, a gift from the Earth.

This validation of your importance and worth,
acknowledgment of your effort and strife.
Take these blossoms, a gift from the Earth,
a pledge to help protect your way of life.

This is an affirmation that you matter.
An offering of appreciation to empower.
Love and praise to drown the hateful chatter,
a beautiful, bulging bouquet of flowers.

Copyright Adrienne S. Wallner/Jaeger

“I write and write and write / until something makes sense” – Me

For Fired Friends

They call you government waste,
a label to use as a tool
to slash at your self-worth without haste,
the go-to tactics, vindictive and cruel.

The labels used as a tool,
“inefficient…poor performance,” but no evidence to support.
The go-to tactics vindictive and cruel,
just another round of blood sport.

“Inefficient…poor performance,” but no evidence to support,
you fight this abominable beast.
Resisting another round of blood sport,
banded together, resiliency is increased. 

Thank you for choosing to serve our country
even when slashed without haste.
I stand with you against this boorish bully
who calls you government waste.

Copyright Adrienne S. Wallner/Jaeger

Why did I post this?

If you know me, you know how much I love our National Parks. I often include this fact in the bios I provide for publication of my work or events: “Adrienne is a poet, traveler, teaching artist, and National Parks advocate.”

In 2012, the first year my husband and I were both teachers with summers off, we visited 19 parks in 21 days. From then on, I was absolutely hooked. I was a full-fledged national park nerd.

In 2016, we were ecstatic to both secure jobs as seasonal interpretive park rangers at Mount Rushmore National Memorial. We lovingly refer to that year as “Our Life Adventure.” It was it an incredible experience to work together in a such an amazing job. And we felt so honored to have to opportunity to help protect, celebrate, and educate visitors about this uniquely American and iconically recognizable work of art.

The National Parks guide the routes that we choose when we travel. Invited to a wedding near Charleston? Great! Let’s fit in visits to Fort Sumter and Fort Moultrie National Historic Park and Charles Pickney National Historic Site as well…) In our long- term quest to visit all of the NPS sites, we are currently at 185 of 433 sites.

Since 2018, we have devoted much of our lives to a National Park that can be incredibly challenging to visit, but also has the highest number of return visitors in the NPS system. We have chosen to do this not just because Isle Royale is unique and wild and beautiful. Not just because we get to spend hours with Lake Superior or because we get to watch moose and wolves walk through our yard or because NPS uniforms are cool. It’s because we care about what is left of our wild, natural places. It’s because we are part of a special community of people who serve America by protecting our National Parks. We are members of a quirky family of scientists, researchers, maintenance workers, trail crews, teachers, interpretive rangers, volunteers, contractors, law enforcement rangers, and all manner of delightfully wonderful weirdos who choose to spend half of the year working on a remote island where you can only get groceries once a week after they have made their way to the island via a 6-hour boat ride.

Today, I know that many of our friends and park family have stood up to peacefully protest the recent firings of over 1,000 National Park Service employees and 3,400 Forest Service employees. (And the threats to the National Park and other federal lands for drilling and “development of domestic resources” and…)

That is why I wrote these poems. Instead of worrying that this post is the not the follow up to the last post (from 4 years ago…) I recalled instead what the purpose of my digital platform is. Whatever I want it to be. What’s the point of being snazzy with words if I don’t put them to use when I give a damn?

Today, I know that my voice is my power. My art is my support. My words are my weapons. My light will not go out.

A huge THANK YOU to everyone who has reached out to us to check in and ask how we and our federal friends are doing. Your care and support means a lot and we appreciate your concern. It’s important to us that you are aware of the threats to our National Parks and the very real and life-altering impact that this is having on the people who keep the parks safe, clean, functioning, and available for your enjoyment. It’s hard to witness and to share in the helplessness, confusion, and uncertainty that so many people we care about are experiencing. But we’re hanging in there.

Inscribed at the top of Roosevelt Arch at Yellowstone National Park, from the 1872 legislation that established Yellowstone National Park.

And, sadly, even if the hiring freeze ends and federal lands are able to begin the hiring process again, we will already be cutting it very close. For many parks, it will already be too late to receive the support that is needed to run efficiently. I say this because the federal hiring process is not a quick one, and with the busy summer season just around the corner, any employees that parks are trying to hire will not even be able to accept their job offer, let alone report to start their position, for several weeks. And that is only after process of hiring is even allowed to begin again. Trust me. We’ve gone through this process more than 10 times. It’s only goes one speed: slow.

If this is the first time this issue has come across your newsfeed I hate to have to be the one to tell you that YOUR National Parks are at risk. If there aren’t enough rangers and support staff to keep the National Parks and other federal lands like National Forests and BLM running efficiently and safely, visitors will suffer, as will the park resources. Th his willa dversly affect the trails, the visitor services and visitors centers, the campgrounds, the facilities, the restrooms, the tours, the ranger talks, the heavily visited attractions, the remote reaches, the roads, the transportation, the traffic, the rescue and recovery resources, the medial aid, and more. And the potential harm that may come will not be as easily undone.

Please do what you can to support the parks and the people who work there. Check in on your federal employee friends. Let our government know that you care about the National Parks and do not want them to fall into disrepair or become dangerous for visitors and for the environment. With lack of funds and staff to properly protect and care for these special places, YOUR National Parks will suffer.

Though this post is focused on federal lands and their stewards, public lands are far from the only entity being affected by these hiring and funding freezes and cuts. The Department of Veteran’s Affairs, the National Weather Service, the Defense Department, the Education Department, the Energy Department, Department of Defense, the Justice Department, Department of Heath and Human Services, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Federal Grants and Loans, and many other federally funded entities are struggling right now.

So this is me doing what I can. Advocating for the parks, as I always do, and letting you know what’s going on in our life. Thanks for reading. Thanks for caring.

“Now, I write and write and write 

and the only thing that makes sense
is to persist
to resist
to insist
on something better.

I can provide relief.
I can speak truth.
I can supply poetry.

I can write
like life depends on it.

Because it does.

To bring 
something better 
in 

is the only way 	out.”

-From “After the Inauguration,” in my book To the 4 a.m. Light, from Finishing Line Press

About the Pantoum Form

A poetic form that originated in Malaysia, the Pantoum gained popularity in Europe and North America in the19th and 20th centuries. It is composed of a series of quatrains; the second and fourth lines of each stanza are repeated as the first and third lines of the next stanza, with a repeating rhyme scheme. I love how repetition works overtime in this form and how just the slightest alteration of a punctuation or tense in a repeated line can affect the entire energy of the stanza.

“The most regretful people on earth are those who felt the call to creative work, who felt their own creative power restive and uprising, and gave to it neither power nor time." - Mary Oliver