Kilimanjaro’s Next Indignity

“Great, high and unbelievably white in the sun …”

— Ernest Hemingway

“A green-gold expanse of savannah,

Above it, purple horizon-hiding haze,

Above that, a pyramid of improbability,”

White Kilimanjaro suspends my gaze!

For wood to burn, build man’s habitat,

Forests below stripped bare of green,

Moisture of rising winds dried out,

No snows replenish ice sheen.

Ice on the cliffs is slated to abate,

In ten years time only rock and dirt

Shasta of the plains turned brown, gray,

In his grave Hemingway turns over, hurt.

But this is not the greatest insult,

Plan discussions now under way,

To save ice cliffs white crystal glint,

With a polypropylene overlay,

To block sun’s rays melting ice,

Make substitute intermediate white,

Tourist trade to continue briskly,

With Kilimanjaro shining bright.

Cliffs marbled heights can range

Sixty to a hundred fifty feet high —

Hang brilliant sheets on icy cliffs,

A square mile three miles in sky!

To last for decades, maybe ten,

Time to restore plains below,

Plant trees, native shrubs again,

Bring former humid green glow.

I hate to toss a cold, wet blanket

On ideas already sweated out,

But this may be less than bright.

Please? One more planning bout!

Questions for designers answer,

Of this most foolish of gambles,

What is the life of these sheets,

When wind at the top ambles

Across cliff’s face at ninety plus,

Will they rip, tear and sail away,

Trash great equatorial Africa

With wilted and tattered plastic array?

Should man mock nature even more

Than we have with our big number?

We cut the source of snow and ice

For cooking and building lumber.

We’ve savaged the ecology,

For additional mouths to feed,

Ravaged her protective mantle,

And left expanses raw to bleed.

Let’s do something smart for a change,

Distribute birth control measures,

For that is the answer my friends,

If we would save nature’s treasures.

For future’s sake, plant trees and stand back,

Forest humidity will lead fight,

Low tech is response to damage toll —

Let green bleed Kilimanjaro white.