To end National Poetry Month here are 30 senryu for the 30th\u00a0of April.\u00a0
\nThursday, April 30, 2015 there will be a public meeting for the \u201cCNMI Joint Military Training Draft Environmental Impact Statement\/ Overseas Environmental Impact Statement\u201d at the Tinian Jr. Sr. High School cafeteria from 5pm to 8pm. With a title like that, is it any wonder the (EIS) Overseas (OEIS) statement is over 1,000 pages long? The military has provided copies to be read online, which include a 40-page executive summary. I used the summary as a basis for my short poems (containing opinions) found below. I have put certain terms in CAPITAL LETTERS to emphasize the terms as they are found in the impact statement itself. Senryu are haiku about people.<\/p>\n
S. T. O. P. \u2013 S.enryu T.inian O.peration P.oetry
\nT.H.I.N.K. \u2013 T.inian H.as I.nformative N.ew K.nowledge
\n\u00a0
\nbombs above Pagan
\nguns in Tinian below
\nwho gets hurt we don\u2019t know
\n\u00a0
\nEIS \/OEIS impact statement
\none thousand pages long
\ngot anything wrong?
\n\u00a0
\nUnai Chulu ramp
\nbringing in the heavy stuff
\nwhen will enough be enough?
\n\u00a0
\ntake a look sixty days
\nEIS thicker than NYC phone book
\nleft me in a daze
\n\u00a0
\nlisten to the request
\ntake time to learn what\u2019s between us
\nfrom GOVERNOR INOS
\n\u00a0
\ntaotao Marianas
\nread the executive summary
\nget info on modern gunnery
\n\u00a0
\nPagan inert bombs
\nTinian live ammunition
\nlearn the definition
\n\u00a0
\nsoldiers at Tinian stationed
\nNINETY FIVE for the duration
\nhelp for science education?
\n\u00a0
\nIBB radio station
\nmove it or not
\ntopic is hot
\n\u00a0
\nabout the radio station
\nconflicting situation
\nstrategic complication
\n\u00a0
\nwin win military and Tinian
\nair thoughts for clearing
\noutcome of hearings
\n\u00a0
\nlive munitions dump
\njust before the runway begins
\nonly explosion wins
\n\u00a0
\ntalk about road side device
\nlive ammo before landing
\nmilitary needs to think twice
\n\u00a0
\nUnai Chulu
\nramp on ancient village site
\ndoesn\u2019t seem right
\n\u00a0
\nabout Invasion Beach
\nexercise your freedom of speech
\npractice what you preach
\n\u00a0
\n\u201cas we now live\u201d is the
\nNO ACTION ALTERNATIVE
\nno one to forgive
\n\u00a0
\nTinian right now
\nfour live fire ranges
\nwhy make changes?
\n\u00a0
\nmilitary water use
\nmillions of gallons
\nany left for STALLIONS?<\/p>\n
RANGE OPERATIONS
\nlose the radio station
\npossible situation<\/p>\n
\u00a0AMPHIBIOUS ASSAULT VEHICLE
\nlanding at Chulu Beach
\nwill tourists ever reach<\/p>\n
four miles off the coast
\nALT. SURFACE DANGER ZONE
\nfishermen must leave alone<\/p>\n
MUNITIONS STORAGE AREA
\nin direct flight path
\nwho did the math?
\n\u00a0
\nhearing today
\nin high school cafeteria
\nhear the criteria<\/p>\n
eight to ten years
\nannounced for construction
\nhow much destruction?<\/p>\n
will our cows
\nbe in danger
\nas they browse?<\/p>\n
planes in the air
\nuse\u00a0 more gas to divert
\nnew route and price unfair ?<\/p>\n
US military did their work
\nwe can\u2019t forget KIM
\nthe North Korean jerk<\/p>\n
Stalinist dictator
\nKim the Young Un
\ncompletely crazy one<\/p>\n
he starves the poor
\nmore statues of him in store
\nwe\u2019ve seen it before<\/p>\n
Kim in power by birth
\nrules one of poorest countries
\non earth without any mirth<\/p>\n
(To read the EIS statement go to: www.CNMIJointMilitaryTrainingEIS.com.)<\/p>\n
Joey ‘Pepe Batbon’ Connolly<\/strong> Joey \u201cPepe Batbon\u201d Connolly is a retired teacher and poet living on Tinian who taught English in CNMI public schools for the past 30 years. He has also taught in Alaska, New Orleans, and Las Vegas.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" To end National Poetry Month here are 30 senryu for the 30th\u00a0of April.\u00a0 Thursday, April…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[1503,4217,200,1377],"class_list":["post-200386","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-opinion","tag-eis","tag-ibb","tag-military","tag-unai-chulu"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200386","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=200386"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200386\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=200386"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=200386"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=200386"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nSpecial to the Saipan Tribune<\/em><\/p>\n