I visited the Anglican Church of Melanesia this September, in part to see first hand the impacts of Climate Change in the Pacific. I was struck by how tangible those impacts are and the real sense of vulnerability in these island nations. However I was also struck by the sense that though these islands may be vulnerable, they are not powerless. I wrote this poem to express some of that.

There is a vulnerability in these
small Islands where the challenges they face
are mostly not of their own making.  Seas
are rising, trees are being felled, the race
for land and for development is fierce –
their magnitude could flood the roads with tears.
But vulnerable does not mean powerless.
Developing does not mean uninformed.
These islands, villages, and towns are getting
ready now to face the gathering storm.
Stone by stone, day by day, resisting
those forces that would stop them from existing.
Here, where land and sea are in a battle aeons long,
a fragile hope against all odds has always been their song.

(c) Rich Clarkson 2025