THE END OF THE WORLD
It is a subject so profound I feel I should
be under water to think about it properly.
In the most popular version, the sky explodes,
and horsemen gallop out of the flaming clouds,
pale and bloody, their cloaks flying wickedly.
The disconcerting poctry of Revelations describes
their iron breastplates as being blue as hyacinths.
I have no trouble imagining the oceans boiling away
like tea water and groves of olive trees turning to ash.
I can even see wheels revolving within wheels,
the mouths of furnaces,and a scarlet beast carrying
the whore of Babylon. I can hear the annunciatory
trumpets
and the groans of those who seek death and find it not.
But here in the calm latitudes of this room
1 am thinking that the end could be less operatic.
Maybe a black tarpaulin, a kind of boat cover,
could be lowered over the universe one night.
A hand could enter the picture and crumple the cosmos
into a ball of paper and hook it into a waste basket.
A gigantic door might close. horrible bell could ring
We could have fire, ice, bang and whimper all at once.
But who has the time to consider such horrors
when the world’s body keeps pressing up against us
with the weight of its beauty, its dizzying sea cliffs
and coasting birds, its rolling fairways and deep pine
woods?
Who could imagine all this coming to a sudden end
but the lone visionary we al ways picture
on a street corner, gaunt, bearded, holding up
🌟
@peacewriter51
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