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Keep Up the Good Work
Hello Friends, This is an Earth Day thank you, hug and general keep up
the great work card from (getting to be long-time) supporters of Native
Forest Council's work. It's sad to witness the vestiges of industrial
exploitation of the earth's abundance so greatly diminish the quality
of life we are passing along to our children. We live not far from where
Rachel Carson's life drew to a close nearly four decades ago, and I shudder
at the ecosystem decline and loss since then. How would she assess the
modern ethic for conservation, personal responsibility and reverence for
creation? I trust that NFC would score well, but as a society we have
been tragically sleeping. We know that Republican, legislative and judicial
control means increased pressure on our sacred public lands. We must work
tirelessly to protect our inheritance and remember that no struggle to
protect life on earth is ever over-The pressure to exploit and develop
will be back tomorrow. We know that NFC will be there, too, carrying our
message: No More Logging on Federal Land! (Camp fire allowances as needed!)
Please, please know that your good efforts are making a difference. David
Brower, quoted in Earth Island Journal, Summer 2002: "Don't expect politicians
to do your job for you. Politicians are like weather vanes. Our job is
to make the wind blow!"
-Barbie Lynch, Mark Keating, Celeste Keating, Takoma Park, MD
A Terrible Loss
Dry and bitter cold, with flint hard rock and treeless mountains, the
vistas of the Great Basin echo like a moonscape, dazzling with abandoned
beauty. If the left behind and rejected places still astonish with God's
creation what were the rich valleys like before we altered the land for
ease and commerce. There is a terrible loss we leave unspoken, worse than
our unrelenting devotion to war. We've silenced His voice in the rivers
and paved over Her beauty. What grief must lay before us.
-Don Hynes, Portland, OR
Support from New York High School
The Environmental Club of Centereach High School strives to recognize
notable organizations that serve the community on environmental issues.
This year the Club members have decided to donate money from their fundraising
efforts to Native Forest Council so that you may continue your good work.
Please accept our enclosed donation. We hope it will assist your organization
in its continued efforts to protect our public lands, most particularly
our treasured national forests.
-Sincerely, Elaine Maas, Environmental Club Advisor, Centereach, New York
Editors note: Centereach Environmental Club chose one local, regional
and national organization that focuses on each of the central elements
of the environment: land, air and water. The Club chose Native Forest
Council as the national recipient of their donation because of our mission
to protect and preserve public lands.
What We See
The intense deep cobalt blue of the lake makes me think of Crater Lake.
But this lake is not a perfect circle. It is more the shape of an apostrophe.
There is a trunk of an old pine lying in the water. Move up the trail,
look back, and we can still see the tree lying there. It's that big. The
slope is steep, and as we climb you point out something perched on a dead
snag. It looks like an eagle but is too large. I've never seen a bird
that large. The color appears dazzling white, but also blue, and it is
the blue that holds my attention. The head is white like a bald eagle,
I think, but it takes off before we can get a better look. Then we see
higher in the sky other like birds circling. They look too large to be
able to fly but they are floating in wide circles like buzzards who have
spotted death. We look for other people to witness this sight but there
is no one close enough to hear us. We want to leave and find people to
bring back to this spot. We don't want this story to be dismissed. We
want to understand what it is that we are witnessing. Then, as we watch
to our right, moving across the sky, a group of Botticelli-like women,
hair and clothing draping gracefully around their forms, each leans toward
the other in exquisite sympathy, each supports the other together ascending.
Later I approach a roomful of people and I inquire if anyone has seen
the eagle, but I don't mention the women. This weekend I read that a young
woman, Beth O'Brien, fell to her death from a tree while protesting the
Eagle Creek timber sale. The sale was cancelled a few days before her
fall but it was said the protesters couldn't be reached because of the
snow. The parties involved with the decision said that the cancellation
had nothing to do with the protesters. Our senator called the death of
the young woman a "waste." No recognition for her sacrifice is given here
on the ground. The sightings of the blue eagles and the young women occurred
in a dream a day or two before reading of the death of the young protester.
-Barb Emge, Eugene, OR
Native Voice
For Tim Hermach
In memory the reflection lies upon a wasteland opening where the untrammeled
heart will no longer contain this destruction. Your life sifts through
volumes of information, grains of sand in the hour glass turning upon
itself: "There's no time to do it again, nutrients of fragile forest giants
stacked 10,000 years, a light switch of catastrophic change hinged on
global warming." The crust of a military presence brings forth this child
of peace whose anger no longer contains any mercy for the source of our
degradation. So, mingling spirits in fire, you make your stand: We are
coming. Get out of the way. We are in your face forever. WE WILL NOT COMPROMISE!
-Lloyd Marbet, Boring, Oregon
2000 Secretary of State Green Party Candidate
Chief petitioner of Campaign Finance Reform initiative
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