It is called Earth, and
In this hemisphere,
The inhabitants lay sleeping
All the things that crawl
Or fly, or slither, or swim
Or walk upon the earth
Were sleeping.
All the moral things, that is.
Silence reigns except for
The predators, the ones that
Stalk the sleepers in their nests,
In their burrows, beds, and hiding places.
Catching them dreaming of tomorrows to
Come, or yesterdays parading by
In glory, of days fading
From memories.
Noble dreams, one and all.
Screams, shrieks, and death
rattles
Punctuate the darkness with
Gurgling finalities, disturbing
And causing some to toss and
Shift position, while still abed.
Some know that if they fall asleep
They will become part of
Nature's protein chain, but
They cannot stay alert, and dream.
Vivid Technicolor visions.
Soon, a gray pre-dawn light
On the Eastern horizon,
Portending of daybreak to come.
Many turn to find a position
That hides the lightening
Sky. The early risers, take to
Wing, and catch the careless slugs
And unthinking worms,
That leave those silvery trails
Ending in the middle of vast
Concrete walkways. Mysterious endings!
The good, have begun to arise.
Relays close, complete circuits,
and electrons
Flow, causing last night's mixtures of
Coffee to begin to brew
Waking ever more to greet the
Morning. These are those that have to
Travel far, or that have to prepare
The ways, the food, the deliveries
For those that still sleep
Those others still snuggled in
The deepest sleep, their most animated
dream states causing them to moan and toss.
The ethical are almost all up by now.
Alarms, buzzers, music, a maid,
all
Forms of noise nuisance to awake us.
A brightening towards the East,
Soon dark clouds take on
Orange sherbet tinged edges, and
Cotton candy fluffiness suffuses
The gray masses. The birds are
Warbling a cacophony chorus of chirps
And tweets, and peeps.
Farmers are tending their crops.
Now the bankers, the brokers, the
Realtors,
The bureaucrats, the unemployed, the
Coke-heads, the drunkards, the homeless
Begin to awake. Some to do good,
Some to steal hard-earned livings from others
The pot-bellied patrolmen are all on their
Appointed rounds. The announcers begin to
Bombard us with the ugliness that has
Transpired over the period of darkness
While we slept in our beds, unaware.
The good are few in number.
A blazing sun breaks over the edge
Of the earth and causes
The commuters to pull down their
Sunshades, don their expensive
Tinted glasses, and squint into
The nuclear holocaust more than
93 million miles from our earth.
The planet is being plundered.
Traffic reports cause detours to
be
Extemporaneously devised, taking
Travelers where they have seldom
Gone before. Taking notice of the children
On their way to school, and
Huge rubber-tired boxcars bringing
Goods for the shelves of our stores.
The oceans and forests are being exterminated.
They curse the busses with their
Black clouds of diesel stench and thank
Their fortunes, that they no longer
Have to ride them, crowded, uncomfortable,
Schedules made for machines and
Not for people's welfare and comfort.
The air is causing our lungs to mutate.
Finally, the bumper-to-bumper
traffic jams
Surrounding garages, where we deposit our
Gas guzzling, pollution spewing
Behemoths, are in sight. Lining up,
We breathe in the foulness that
contaminates the air, the odious stench of progress.
We await our turn to take a ticket
And leave our cars sitting all the
Day long, patiently awaiting our return.
No intelligent being drinks tap water.
Riding the elevator to our office
Perched high above the
Motorized beetles below, the ant-like
Pedestrians, we hesitate and
Get our cup of java,
Lacing it with chemicals that have
Never moo-ed, belched, or farted.
Entering our office we sigh in contentment
Looking out and admiring the dawn.
"This is the way the world ends . . . "
Written by Dale E. Malone, Want
to go out and pick up litter?
The Great & Wonderful Kahuna wants to know!
Last
modified: April 26, 2009