National Poetry Month: Climate Change

Kayaking along Market Street

The waters are rising

Inundating islands

occupied by the innocent

Surging over cities seething

with the unrepentant

Kayaking along Market Street

enjoying the novelty

Until Charleston became a swamp
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According to our government's Fourth National Climate Assessment Report, the social, economic, and environmental systems along the coasts are being affected by climate change. Threats from sea level rise (SLR) are exacerbated by dynamic processes such as high tide and storm surge flooding, erosion, waves and their effects, saltwater intrusion into coastal aquifers and elevated groundwater table, local rainfall, river runoff, increasing water and surface air temperature, and ocean acidification.

Although storms, floods, and erosion have always been hazards, in combination with rising sea levels they now threaten approximately $1 trillion in national wealth held in coastal real estate and the continued viability of coastal communities that depend on coastal water, land, and other resources for economic health and cultural integrity. The effects of the coastal risks posed by a changing climate already are and will continue to be experienced in both intersecting and distinct ways, and coastal areas are already beginning to take actions to address and ameliorate these risks. Charleston is one such city. Others are ignoring them, or even prohibiting their mention in city planning documents.