My darling, even hundreds
of years mean nothing
to minerals or invertebrates
geologic time
will blink and
never register
our existence.
This is to say
we will not be missed.
Blessed are those who lean against the railing
of Eden precisely because
of the effort it requires
to say it aloud.
Maybe we’ll be fossils
left to thaw and degrade—
sedimentary layers
like trash oils
coating the bottom of
the hijacked earth.
Blessed are the deserters. Every
dying narcissist wishes on a satellite
to be as memorable as
all of the plastic and Styrofoam
we already know will outlive us.
Who will track the seasons
in the endless ozone summer
we’ve created?
Blessed are the artists gifted with firm consciousness
of our destroyed future. Keep searching for the right
quarter note or brushstroke to capture
our last winter with snow
or the effortless burst of a flock vanishing
into glitter against the black veil of sky—
cloudless, we are gathered
here
under azure night
in loving memory of starry skies—
illusory shimmer of plumage
not unlike little birds
you once fed from cupped hands
at the fence, birds
who arrived endangered at the edge
of this blue silk emptiness
much earlier than expected.
