On my first trip to the National Seashore in Cape Cod a few summers ago, I was confronted by plastic: cups, buoys, lobster line, toys, fishing detritus, and all the other polymer bibs and bobs of contemporary life that wash up with the tide. It’s a familiar sight on beaches across the world and most pronounced in Southeast Asia, where plastic tides ripple along coasts, catch in the lowest branches of mangrove trees, and flood yards and roads. That day in Cape Cod, I picked up as much as I could carry and eventually filled two more garbage bags, which I brought back to Brooklyn.

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