Robert Kennedy, Jr. and Backstreet Boys' Kevin Richardson Join Us at Congressional Hearing and Press Conference Calling for an End to Illegal Mountaintop Removal

I am Appalachia  a poem by Mick McCoy

I am Appalachia. 
Once I was strong. Now I continue to be weakened by cold hearted coal barons who rape me for my resources, leaving my once majestic peaks flat and dead, then return to their homes hundreds of miles from my mountain range.

I am Appalachia. 
Once I was proud. Now I am ashamed of how elected officials, ever so thirsty for campaign contributions from coal czars, are willing to look the other way and change definitions to existing laws in order to stroke these hilltop hounds, while transforming EPA and the Army Corps of Engineers into puppets to perform at the company's delight.

I am Appalachia. 
Once I was fruitful. Ah, but now my streams and hollows are being filled with coal waste, such as Massey Coal's release of 300 million gallons of sludge, suffocating all aquatic life and making public water reservoirs in my valley unfit for consumption by man or beast.

I am Appalachia. 
Today I call upon those Congressmen who are not for sale ‹ who are not lap puppies for the rich and lawless ‹ and who are courageous enough to wage war against Environmental Terrorism going on in my land-to please stand- stand for me and my people, and oh, do it soon, do it now.

For I am Appalachia, 
and I, along with every living thing within me, am dying.

Mick McCoy 
Inez, Kentucky