Shadows claim me with a sense of obligation
that is the stronger since I know it is unfounded.
I stand in shallows of an edgeless river;
I try to remember towns that it contains.
I was born downstream of here in a coastal city,
a term we are forgetting now they are gone.
Behind me a dwindling people marches on.

I conflate thoughts no one should need to have.
The short disastrous reigns of evil emperors…
Rains, reins, reigns. It’s criminally late to care.
Whose fault is it we let democracy die?
Were Von Trumpf and Pinz the plague’s causatives or symptoms?
We groped too vigorously in the cookie jar.
When we broke it we rejoiced at the noise.

I conflate thoughts no one should need to have.
’Why not,’ Mad Hatter asked, ‘give war a chance?’
We did. We fought. We died. We are still too many
for Earth to feed, now we have broken Her.
We did not break the Earth. At most we scratched
or irritated Earth, till She broke free
of Her patience for the spreading skin disease

(I conflate thoughts no one should need to have)
we were to Her. Her ancient Deccan Traps
reopened. She ignited Yellowstone.
Stood in silt, I feel fish graze my legs.
There are no fish. Plastic trash is what I feel.
Plastic: the ice-nine we gave to Earth
before we began to capitalise Her Name
and venerate Her, the way we do with Things
and People once we’ve killed them and they’re gone.

Alone in shade-stuck shallows you’d think I’d drown
but someone sees and hails me. We march on.