“Leave”: A poet forced from her home by wind turbines (Ontario)
Apr 27, 2014
Print Article
Editor’s note: Esther Wrightman — the young mother who became the face and voice of massive, organized resistance to wind energy companies in western Ontario. Famous for satirizing NextEra as “NextTerror,” and triggering a lawsuit from the offended corporation. Esther and her family are leaving Ontario, “shaking the dust off their feet” as they depart.
Esther and her father, Harvey Wrightman, endured the indignity of an “appeal” before the Ministry of the Environment’s so-called Environmental Review Tribunal, which, it turns out, is basically a front for wind energy companies and the Green Energy Act. (This is the hearing where Dr. Pierpont was deemed unqualified to testify regarding Wind Turbine Syndrome. In fact, virtually all of the Wrightmans’ expert witnesses, including their WTS victims, were shit-canned — denied a hearing.)
The Wrightmans have concluded that Ontario has become a chapter in Lewis Carroll’s surreal, “Alice in Wonderland.” They are leaving “Ontario in Wonderland” for New Brunswick, Canada — a province that takes a dim view of bullshit wind energy.
Esther is a poet. I predict she will be hailed someday as one of Canada’s premier poets. Visit her website. Esther wrote the following lament as she has watched wind energy employees bulldoze and torch the landscape — trees, pond, fields, wildlife habitat — surrounding her home.
A new “Silent Spring” is underway outside her window. One that will turn into an “ILFN-Rich Spring” once those turbines begin operating — and the wildlife altogether vanish, along with the Wrightman family.
..
“Leave”
I should have known
..that night watching
…our gracious hollow tree in the field
….burst into flames.
And firemen running about —
..frenzied ants — revealing
her charred remains.
Something should have clicked
..when the pine,
…(patiently leaning,
….a hundred years)
twisted to the ground.
And even last week,
..in case I didn’t get the message,
that Manitoba maple
..with all the keys to the world,
…where the early days hammock .. hung
…forever,
snapped in half.
Leave,
as the yellow house
dismantles — brick by
brick,
fence lines rip up
as an old roll of fabric,
ponds, bursting with every frog we know
become backfilled graves,
and cabooses and box cars
morph into black tankers and
white towers — eagles to
vultures and
wild grass to
tiled Land
Now, put out the flames
with waves of tears, and
leave.
— Esther Wrightman (April 2014)
Comment by Kaz Pease on 04/27/2014 at 5:55 pm
Esther’s poetry is powerful…
But more importantly, her story and that of her family is indicative of what so many people — worldwide — are confronting.
Stay and fight?
Or leave and secure health and well-being?
In Esther’s case, I have no doubt that both questions will be answered.
She is doing what she needs to do…and what is best for her family.
Does that mean she’s given up?
NO!
Does that mean that Nexterror has won?
NO!
So…what DOES it mean?
I’m not Esther…but I believe that what this means is she is changing tacks. She has an obligation to protect her most precious resource — her family– and protect her ‘home’…even though ‘home’ is moving to another province.
We support her conscientious decision.
But we (or anyone else) would be foolish to believe that this is the last we willl hear from Esther Wrightman on the issue of grid-scale industrial wind.
Just sayin’… a lion must rest but a lion will always protect ‘home’…no matter where it is or who resides there.
Kaz
Comment by Shellie Correia on 04/27/2014 at 6:33 pm
I cannot begin to express the sadness and anger that I feel over this travesty of justice. This scenario has been, and will be, repeated over and over, till people scream out en masse and demand that it STOP!!!!
Do NOT vote for any politician that condones the faux green scam, in any way!
Comment by anonymous on 04/27/2014 at 7:31 pm
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/10/22/us/james-phillips-70-environmentalist-who-was-called-the-fox.html
http://www.chicagoreader.com/chicago/who-was-that-masked-man/Content?oid=907204
“The Fox” was a well publicized secret folk hero activist who made a big difference in awareness and action in his time.
The Fox and Esther are cut from the same cloth, years and miles apart. Big companies creating all forms of pollution proved they fear public reaction to such individuals.
Comment by sue hobart on 04/28/2014 at 8:20 am
We closed the doors forever on our own home (Falmouth, Mass.) in a ruined paradise just last week. We have cried all our tears now, sighed all our sighs and closed the doors on the illnesses it caused. Now is time to heal, become strong and save our strength for testimony when the right time comes. And it will, of that I have no doubt … And I will be there from a position of strength.
If you are being harmed by these turbines and your health is at risk you HAVE to leave. Nothing is worth more than your health and no amount of property is worth a dime when you are disabled. Take a leap of faith and just go … Camping, if you must, to get some equilibrium back, will clear your mind and you will know yourself again — know who you really are.
I almost martyred myself for the damnable things … and they are not worth my life, your life or one more day of suffering. Get clear while you still can, my friends … it hurts but it’s necessary.
Comment by Marshall Rosenthal on 04/28/2014 at 9:48 am
Every word of praise for Esther that I have written still must stand. It is each of our sacred duty to protect ourselves and our families, especially from direct assault on health and wellbeing. The body is the temple. It must be kept well, whole, and intact.
We must learn to run, only to return to fight again from renewed strength with more sisters and brothers in arms.
Some people think that it is their duty to bow to the on-rush of technology, that this is progress. The IWTs are a form of technology that is almost entirely automated, machines that must be served and acquiesced to. They are inimical to all forms of life: human, avian, bat, bear, deer, bee, and more — all creatures given the sacred gift of life, not to be destroyed nor set aside, but to be revered and protected.
The media refers to the acts of property damage against the bulldozers and transport vehicles in Ontario as vandalism. This is a misnomer. These are acts of sabotage taken by desperate and angry people in a lopsided battle against the beast that would destroy their lives. What happened to Sr. Hector Regalado Jimenez in Oaxaca, Mexico, a Zapotecan Indian leader of the anti-wind turbine resistance to save his tribal lands, was state sanctioned murder.
WE MUST FIGHT ON IN EVERY WAY WE CAN TO RETURN THE WORLD TO SANITY AND DECENCY!
Comment by Cary Shineldecker on 04/28/2014 at 12:13 pm
My thoughts and prayers are with Esther and her family. I know too well the fight and plight. At some point we must simply walk away. Not admitting defeat but rather claiming self preservation. Before, it was an unimaginable thought … But now it seems our destiny.
God Bless.
Comment by Susan Wright on 04/29/2014 at 10:19 pm
It’s a very sad day in Ontario. It brought tears to my eyes when I heard of Esther Wrightman’s plight.
Mark my words, this fight will continue until sanity is restored and Ontario will be livable again!