God forgive us if this world,
a world torrential with
our cyclonic tempers, be
the last world created. Not
that we are all that ignorant of
others nurtured by this planet
to fruition, whether they be
sea bottoms of trilobites or
lands ravaged by tyrannosaurs.
Those worlds pummeled into
extinction by an errant asteroid
or the reflux of vulcanism.
Decades since we first pulled
the triggers on hydrogen flashes.
What’s next? Cities drown
by tides? A sky choked brown?
We wallow in a smog while
each day corrodes into the next.
Belligerence struts like virtue
in the marketplace. Pandemics
sweep continents like the soot
carried on jet streams. See how
our fingerprints smudge
compass points. Our oily stains.
— STEPHEN REILLY
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