I
They hear the cracking sounds in Paradise
each giant movement racked with so much pain
those great ships plowing through the polar ice
sound damp as squibs caught in October rain.
Erosion downward fairly strikes the Earth
and if we thought it was a fallacy
that soil is wealth, yet there’s an end to worth,
that vitriol, degradability,
lies still as asphalt on a country road
deceptive, almost, in disquietude;
our SUVs skidmark their spoiled abode
but now must reckon with their plenitude.
Reality so bright, it hurts our eyes
with jagged lightning bolts of compromise.
II
With jagged lightning bolts of compromise
tectonic fates and bedrock come unsealed
gargantuan though it may seem in size
our billions dwarf the planet’s battlefield.
The heftiness of us constricts her girth;
the forced ballet she dances gaunt and thin
as metronomes can scarcely hide their mirth
they beat their triumph, and time closes in.
A breathless rasp is how to best describe
her scrap of voice, a denigrated blur;
for human rights, we mount a diatribe
and yet who spends one liberty for her?
Earth’s dénouement trails off in grand absurds.
And selfishly we grate out autumn words.
III
And selfishly we grate out autumn words,
malign and somber any sky of blue
delight in punished letters afterwards
twist every sunlight to a fading hue.
Inanimacy, tiny sharpnesses.
As if we’re filming and in two small frames
what once was priceless, craft in every tress,
lies shattered, edges on a heap in flames.
Without a second glance, the things we do —
behold Earth brazenly, pick up a knife
then murder air and water, only two
of all her children, as we autumn life.
Sweet embered light, forced to misshapen curds,
new moons, dry leaves blown free of hummingbirds.
IV
New moons, dry leaves blown free of hummingbirds;
we have the gall to wonder shamelessly
how we inherited a life of thirds.
Apocalypse arrives in tribes of three.
Like freshly emptied childhood happiness
how often does the globe just turn your way
if ev’rything you do will wrap distress
in sabotage, rolled up in disarray?
If you placed spike strips on the highway lanes,
forgot yourself, raced back and tires blew
your foolish act would aneuryse your veins,
your mind made ready for the death of you.
Bewilderment still dares to question why
as oceans spill into unearthly sky.
V
As oceans spill into unearthly sky,
dark endlessness lodged deep in outer space,
the body planet will transmogrify,
the laws of physics twisted out of place.
Lost forest splinters through the atmosphere
with China sticking to America
then swaths of mountain start to disappear
while Bundes Deutschland hugs South Africa.
Our world, now flattened, hurtles round the sun
still magnetizing Earthlings, ev’ry creed;
as sleek as coin, our home’s a graphic pun —
her mercenaries stamp her into greed.
As devastations slowly vilify,
a solar planet and her moon will cry.
VI
A solar planet and her moon will cry,
for lovely Earth was really born a twin.
Though almost no one knows or wonders why
her birthplace is the land where days begin.
The summer stolen and the winter near,
from birth kept locked apart without a key
transported by the sun, she strides in fear
this orphanage, Pluto to Mercury.
Yet somewhere far away her sister waits,
awash with joy while Earth must bide her time.
May she be rescued past the solar gates
for all this galaxy inflicts is crime.
Will planets liberate themselves one day?
If Earth had palms, what would the reader say?
VII
If Earth had palms, what would the reader say?
That grand conceits can never speak for her.
We’re accidents with upright vertebrae,
all worthless fakes, yet never wealthier.
Time’s slipping through your fingers, day by day.
Illusion tethers your perimeter;
to gain your freedom, spin the other way!
Let courage shame your executioner.
Apotheosis of this woeful tale
sees Earthling locusts swarm into defeat
while reunited sister hearts prevail
to taste true justice, new and heaping sweet.
As Earth departs, the cosmic door slams twice.
They hear the cracking sounds in Paradise.
Reprise
They hear the cracking sounds in Paradise.
Erosion downward fairly strikes the Earth
with jagged lightning bolts of compromise.
The heftiness of us constricts her girth.
And selfishly we grate out autumn words,
inanimacy, tiny sharpnesses,
new moons, dry leaves blown free of hummingbirds.
Like freshly emptied childhood happiness.
As oceans spill into unearthly sky,
lost forest splinters through the atmosphere.
A solar planet and her moon will cry,
the summer stolen and the winter near.
If Earth had palms, what would the reader say?
time’s slipping through your fingers, day by day.
Deb Blondell-Pitt, November 2017
Writing on allpoetry as dblon
Read more of her work:
https://allpoetry.com/dblon