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Earth As We Knew It

Charles Albano

It was a self-regulating system,
a triumph of nature
and the God of Nature.
It is the first and truest home
we will ever know,
and, in all probability,
an unmatched gem.

In one short lifetime
its wounds
have accumulated
grievously.

Our life-spawning planet
has fallen prey
to the foulest imaginable
practices and philosophies.
all portrayed as rational
and in alignment with
nature and the
expected progression
of Mankind.

So- the storyline reads:
it is in the nature of things
that we endure
a succession of wars,
famines, diseases,
and natural disasters.
The affluent insist
these things are
tolerable impediments
on the road to betterment.
And all are reassured
to take comfort in the fact
that science
will heal us and the planet.


While, under cover of
drunken illusions,
unaccountable actors
run amuck across the face
of the earth
scrambling to satiate
unbounded lusts.
They weave greed
into a fabric of "truth,"
elevating it in status
until it is deemed
worthy of emulation
everywhere,
and at all times.


Any beauty and simplicity
that marked pre-modern cultures
is relegated to a past
lacking redeeming virtues.
And anyone who thinks otherwise
is a hopeless loser.


Now this ethic
is rapidly reinforced
in a competitive rush,
as, disease-like,
it stretches its choking veneer
wholecloth
across the globe
in the pursuit of
"self interest."

Already,
in measurable ways,
nature has tipped its scale
against us,
sooner and more
vigorously than thought possible.


The quality of life,
sought, promised,
and deserved
world over
is sliding past
a foreshortened horizon,
its distorted image
fading
with
the
sun
into
the
sea.


I hear a voice
arising inside
that urges us,
at the very least,
to compose an explanation
to the children
standing behind.