Air Quality Index
I remember when the term IED covered the news,
a shiny new term from Bush’s war in Iraq.
After a while it was like it had always been
part of our vocabulary.
The Canadian wildfires put a focus
on AQI, the particulates making up
pollution levels, health risks,
color codes green through maroon.
The numbers top out at 500 – “hazardous” –
and yet the news reports AQI over 800
here by the Great Lakes,
and I’m thinking of black lung disease,
coal miners, COPD, emphysema,
Armageddon, apocalypse, extinction,
and, yes, Improvised Explosive Devices.
Charles Rammelkamp is Prose Editor for BrickHouse Books in Baltimore. A collection of persona poems and dramatic monologues involving burlesque stars, The Trapeze of Your Flesh, was published in 2025 by BlazeVOX Books. His collection, The Tao According to Calvin Coolidge, was recently published by Kelsay Books. A collection of short fiction, Casual Mysteries and Aperçus, has been accepted by BlazeVOX Books.
