the outside agitator

a new radical tradition

1/16 Reportback from Town Hall: NO! to UNC’s proposed PFAS pellets

by dagwood, bridge rider, and community members

on january 16th, 2025, community members spoke in staunch opposition to unc’s request to burn plastic filled pellets as a new energy source. below is a collection of haikus passed between two chapel hill residents during the meeting. visit triangle blog blog for a live-blog of the event & more broad reporting on unc’s request.

i. 

abound, abounding

community expertise

I love my neighbors

ii. 

cogeneration, 

admin wants you to forget, 

is already bad 

iii.

we are the speakers,

current and future victims —

ppast under coal ash

iv. 

overflow is flowed!!

o.g. space in hillsborough

because oh so scared

v. 

be afraid of us

we are more powerful than 

they can imagine

vi.

PFASs in the blood, 

a public experiment. 

Whose hypothesis? 

vii.

can you hear it? now?

neighbors galore, wanting more.

I’m optimistic.

viii.

one part per trillion

bioaccumulate in 

 the future’s bloodstream.

i must implore you —

use whatever power you

have. it is that dire.

i live and breathe in

chapel hill, another thing

to burn i am not.

ix.

enduring question: 

how to check unchecked power? 

this will be our door.

ix.

“only a little

shit to make a shit sandwich,”

“paper class/pellets”

scientists, also 

researchers, also poets.

chapel hill has all.

xi.

I DO NOT CONSENT 

TO BEING POISONED BY THIS 

UNIVERSITY

xii.

Don’t you see they hate

you — not asleep at the wheel.

They hate you. They hate —-

xiii.

Being transported

into the bleak future of

polluted nightmares.

xix.

your decisions will

live in our lungs tomorrow.

Do you understand?