Our Road: Then -- E30: 45th Anniversary: The Grassroots Uprising that Birthed the Warren Co. Environmental Justice Movement:

In this late December, 2023, Podcast Episode 30, Deborah and Ken break from their chronological narrative in order to recognize and celebrate the 45th anniversary of the actual birth of the Warren County environmental justice movement. They follow the extraordinary events that take place in Warren County in late December, 1978, and early 1979, after citizens learn the Hunt Administration plans to bury the roadsides PCBs in Warren County, regardless of their public sentiment.

In this 45th anniversary episode, Ken and Deborah follow in detail how Warren County Citizens Concerned About PCBs responded to the state’s announcement; informed themselves and each other; on the issues; formed an unlikely, multi-racial coalition of citizens who opposed the proposed PCB landfill; affirmed their freedom to determine themselves and their county through the expression of their public sentiments; exposed and stopped a multi-state chemical dump plan for the county; got nearly a 1,000 citizens to an EPA public hearing, with coverage by local, state, and national media, and at breakneck speed, changed the course of Warren County’s environmental justice history — all in two week’s time,

After they describe the grassroots uprising, Ken and Deborah then return to the chronological narrative that their listeners have been following — to late December, 1979, after Ken has sent his PCB analysis to the gubernatorial candidates (Episode 29) and is waiting for their response.

1979 has been a long, hard year. Deborah joins her sister, Victoria, and they leave to spend Christmas in Columbus, Ohio with their family. Ken stays at the cabin, reflects on the year that has past and considers what lies ahead, and writes two poems that he shares with their podcast listeners. (Click transcript above for the text of these poems.)

Transcript

                         
Christmas Eve, 1979:
A Journey to Bethlehem


This humble log cabin seems at times no more than a manger,
cradled in the stars, and I, a stranger from afar, come to worship,
seeking renewal through the wine of a divine ritual.

I’m drunk with the wine of an old age, old clothes, Warrenton wool coats, gifts that fit me well, and worn in memory of one whom I shall never know.

And not with the wine of an old age only,
but as history in casks of wine long mellowed
till some poor unfortunate fellow, with wit for axe breaks open the cask and lets the old wine flow,
so poets in apostolic succession, illuminating present and past, renew the lineage of Christ through the poetic act
and intoxicate my soul.

Poetry, is a journey to Bethlehem.

I haven’t been able to find a card that says just what I would want it to say,
Christmas stubbornly refusing to clone cards of my own musings,
so I break open another cask and cut the wine deep
with the crows-feet of self-reflection,
undermining self-deception,
bending rhyme to meaning in acts of self-restraint.

I am overwrought with wine this Christmas Eve
and with the eternal sadness Socrates heard long ago on the Agean Sea
And it brought into his mind
The eternal ebb and flow of human misery.

Why should the long fermenting old wine flow,
flow again, and so renew the strife — why,
especially, on this holy night?

I am overwrought with wine this Christmas Eve
and come to worship — not in the glory of kings —
But in the shabbiness of ceremony and ritual divine I sing,
frost on my stubbled chin,
hoping to let warm love in,
I am, indeed, fit mockery of the sublime,
but still I sing.

I am overwrought with wine and could go on singing forever,
a mere self-mockery, though clever,
And, no doubt, much to your chagrin —-
But the phone is ringing —-

I’m invited to a noblesse oblige of Christmas Eve.
Though no hierarchical suspenders hold up my genes,
my presence is required to rekindle an old saint’s dream ,
that the aesthetics of fire means no one is cold,
And the Christmas tree that glitters means no one is hungry for the bread of life.

A poet’s dream I know, for fire and cold,
Glittering lights, and hunger for the bread of life
Will ever be at strife — as the new world with the old.

In the grandeur that was Rome,
a child was born to nail a Man to a cross
on Adam’s grave.

Shall I resolve to live in mundane ways
in Adam’s grave beneath the cross,
or as history in casks of wine must mellow
till some poor unfortunate fellow
with wit for axe breaks open the cask,
and lets the old wine flow,
shall I, in apostolic succession,
shoulder my manger, wine, and dull old axe,
and journey to Bethlehem to be born?

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After I wrote my Christmas Eve poem — over the next few days, I continued to think about the PCB journey Deborah and I and Warren County citizens had embarked on a year earlier and wrote another poem I titled: “The Sacred Wood.”

The poems are symbolic and have the same theme, as both anticipate the civil rights
demonstrations, so they are companion pieces. The sacred wood is the title of a collection of essays on poetry and criticism written by 20th century poet T. S. Eliot.
By the sacred wood, I understand those works from tradition, of various classifications
reinterpreted, recreated, and streamed into contemporary works to provide insight into their significance for our times, and perhaps for all times

The speaker of the poem is walking in the woods thinking about trees (the sacred wood), the preservation of which is linked to “our fate.” He is on his way to split and cord wood that had been previously cut and had had a long time to weather.
He finally arrives at the place where he begins to cut and cord the wood,
associating some of the tough, knotted stumps with the kind of resistance which may be needed in the PCB conflict much on his mind, as he thinks about the precedents being set and the environmental fate of Warren County and beyond.

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The Sacred Wood, 1979
By Ken Ferruccio


Time will show we couldn’t concentrate to save our fate only, 
but cared also for the trees,
their circles of destiny winding through our minds,
Informing actions of a political kind.

These seed and soil-grown delights, fed on nature’s dark intrigues,
have a language all their own.

So, we’re children tracing letters for the first time,
Folks told too late we learned too soon all wrong —  
lost snow travelers of a new frontier,
pioneers of an old faith,
whose precedential footprints blown away,
stand alone, where all directions seem the same —
Then, circling through the trees, pine, oak, and hickory,
Wind inward toward the core.

Here, even before maul hits wedge well-placed along lines of least resistance,
we can feel muscle and stringy fiber give as oak and hickory split,
and the two halves, falling away,
are quartered, then corded with the rest.

But there will come a time 
when we will have to be more knot-resistant
to maul and wedge, 
and the axe’s cutting edge,
more like these old weathered stumps,
which at least have to be carried whole
to the agony of hearth, the center of the home.

Then as now, we won’t curse others for our fate,
but rough-hew new hope from old trees,
pine, oak, and hickory.
Time will show we cared about the trees.