Chipko
Saving the trees
We came to the tree with open arms
in hope, with a feel for rain,
we left the forest’s endless charms
and the lost words, and the new alarms
for the great tree’s growing pains.
We knew the wind and we knew the earth
and the desperate sounds of the times,
expecting a death and perhaps a birth
as we held the tree and felt its girth
and the hold it had on our minds.
We chained ourselves to the loss of our hope,
we circled with steel in our wrists
we held on hard- a human rope-
knowing certainty’s uncertain slope
whenever the angry heart resists.
They came with their saws and their machines
and crushed the forest floor,
cut into our shackles and into our dreams,
ignored our pleas, and laughed at our screams–
and nothing was left as before.
There can be no peace if the trees are gone:
no shade or coolness left.
There can be no peace or forest dawn,
and the slow birds waking song-
that world has gone with their theft.
Martin Rieser is both a poet and visual artist. His interactive installations based on his poetry have been shown around the world. Published in Poetry Review, Write to be Counted, The Unpredicted Spring 2020, Magma 74, Morphrog 22; Poetry Kit 2018, Primers Volume 3, Artlyst Anthology 2020, The Alchemy Spoon 2022, Acumen 2024, Ink Sweat & Tears 2019/2023, Shortlisted: Frosted Fire 2019 /2022, Charles Causeley Prize 2020; runner up Norman Nicholson 2020. Winner of the Hastings Poetry Competition 2021. Shortlisted Wolves Poetry Competition 2022, Longlisted Erbecce Prize 2023, Shortlisted Artemesia Arts Poetry Competition 2023/24.
The Chipko movement (Hindi: चिपको आन्दोलन, lit. ’hugging movement’) was a forest conservation movement in India. In the 1970s protesters engaged in tree hugging so that these could not be felled. The role of women became gradually more and more important to the movement until they became its mainstay.
All the photos are from the internet from various re-postings on blogs – they are not credited. All date back to 1973-4.
If you know of any of the photographers, please do let us know.