A poem-a-day protest against the threat posed to our democracy by the current occupant of the White House
Joanne Durham
I Didn’t Want to Make the Next Shampoo
says the EPA chemist
whose job hangs
on a thin strand
of distorted atoms,
patterns she’s never
seen before, unlike
the ones in PFAS, lead,
PCBs she studies
that will kill
more and more
children
since no one
will be left
to protect us—
scientists, managers, janitors
all fired.
She rejected
making a living
by perfecting perfumed
hair products,
spends long hours
detecting poisons
that leak
from landfills
buried beneath
hastily erected homes,
that lurk in coatings
keeping
couches pristine.
She’s made
of molecules
holding her
steady
beside peers
who still believe
the people
deserve better.
She’s fired up,
ready
to resist
the current poison.
Note: The title is a quote from the article “EPA Staff Stand Firm as Administration Lobs Cuts, Baseless Accusations, and Cruelty,” by Derrick Z. Jackson in Vox Populi on March 26, 2025. —Ed.
Joanne Durham is the author of To Drink from a Wider Bowl (Evening Street Press, 2022), winner of the Sinclair Poetry Prize, and the chapbook On Shifting Shoals (Kelsay Books, 2023). Her poetry appears in Poetry South, Vox Populi, River Heron Review, Writers Resist and other journals and anthologies. A retired teacher, Durham lives 50 feet from the ocean on the North Carolina coast.
Indolent Books and editor Michael Broder are back with another poem-a-day series as a creative response to the threat posed to our democracy by the current occupant of the White House. The plan is to continue for all 1460 days of the 47th American presidency.
Find out how to submit poems or flash prose pieces to Second Coming.
If you like Second Coming and you want to support it, consider making a donation to Indolent Arts, the 501(c)(3) nonprofit fiscal sponsor of Indolent Books.
You can use the form below to donate as little as $1.00 (not visible in the email version of this post) or use this link to visit our donation page where you can donate as little as $1.00 or choose titles from the Indolent Books catalogue as thank-you gifts for donations starting at $25.00—The more you give, the more thank-you gift books you get, up to six books for a donation of $100 or more.