Believe Edward Teller

The German-trained scientist

who brought us the H-bomb

 

says we got nothing

to fear from nuclear power.

 

Meanwhile, yellow crust cakes

in pools in New Mexico

 

along the Rio Puerco.

Overnight, boomtowns

 

spring up in the desert

like radioactive yucca.

 

Gallup. Shiprock. Mexican Hat.

Twenty years later

 

Navajo miners cough up

red lungs of uranium.

 

Fifty years later

Denver's International

 

House of Pancakes

built on a radium processing

 

site, still hot, still

spewing radon gas

 

thick as maple syrup.

But don't believe

 

the bleeding hearts.

Believe Kerr-McGee.

 

Believe Edward Teller.

Believe me.

 

Just close your eyes

& it'll all be gone.