Interest rate pain,
Cost of living pain.
Why don’t we talk about climate change pain?
How would we measure it?
What about: How much does it hurt on a scale of 1 to 10?

For the very, very rich I’d say probably not very much;
That is, not yet.
If you were a Pacific Islander I’d say 8 out of 10,
And rising.
Like the sea level
And the frequency and size of tropical cyclones.

Beautiful one day, perfect the next.
That was living on a coastal plain in Australia –
Till one terrible bush fire
Then a flood
And the next and the next –
All in the space of 5 years.
How would you measure
That climate change pain?

 What about, multiply the number of people affected

 by the number of houses lost;

by people lost;

fences burned;

stock burned or washed away;

houses filled with mud, or washed away;

businesses gone?

How much does that hurt
On a scale of 1 to 10?
It’s right off the scale.

Shall we take a closer look climate pain?
Seems to be getting more common and widespread.
Now you are at risk, for example:
If you live on what’s now known as a flood plain;
Or a river that’s liable for sudden dangerous height gain;
Or near a forest;
On the beachfront;
Places where temperatures regularly now reach

dangerous summer highs;
Potential paths of new avalanches from melting glaciers;
Places you never thought before were so unsafe –
Like the places devastated by massive floods in 2024
And unprecedented wildfires in 2025, in Spain.

It goes on.

Or maybe you just get referred pain:
Cost of house insurance rising, or declined-pain;
Cost of veggies and meat going up (again)
Due to flood or storm or drought-pain;
Non longer can afford air-conditioning as the summers get so hot-pain;
Can’t run your tour guiding because the coral has bleached again-pain;
Your aeroplane-home cancelled for bad weather again-pain.
Maybe illness from bushfire smoke chest pain.

Seems like a looming epidemic.
No, a pandemic.
We all need to fight it –
Mitigate and “vaccinate”
(that’s protect against –

it just makes sense.)
And rehabilitate.

Despite all this, though making small gains,
Our governments still vacillate.
Don’t even properly educate.
They are still support the root causes
Of climate change pain

Although in their hearts they must know
We must change our diet
Of fossil fuels.
We have the tools
But, seemingly, not the will.

 

 

 

But till we make the needed changes
The pain will only get stronger,
And get harder to treat.
We must change what we burn to the air,

Before it gets just too much for us to bear.
Ignore it at our peril –

Our ever worsening

climate change pain.

By the way,

On a scale of 1 to 10,
How much is your climate change pain?

😑😒😖😩😰 😣😫😣😖😢