Signs of the End
By John Herlihy

Everywhere we look nowadays,
Ominous signs the earth portrays.
Doomsday coming, the end is near,
Soon to suffer loss of all we hold dear.

Everywhere we look, signs of the end,
Dog days upon us that evils portend.
Smiles shed tears; joy utters groans,
Lost virtue, lost life, now only moans.

We have built a future on all we knew,
Only to stir up a pot of noxious brew.
The air is polluted; the rivers run dry,
The earth quakes as winds utter sigh.

The winner is ready everyone to curse,
The loser goes back home in a hearse.
The evil-hearted enjoy a sweet delight,
The good-hearted suffer endless night.

Nowadays, people only believe the lie,
Only believe what they see with the eye.
Those who doubt what they cannot see,
Never believe, even if you make a plea.

Night still gives way to the rise of dawn,
Birds still awaken by the light of the morn.
Winter covers earth with a cloak of death,
Spring enlivens the garden with its breath.

The sun still rises to mark the passing hours,
The moon still shines down from lofty towers.
The stars still come out in the middle of night,
The sun’s planets still orbit far beyond our sight.

The baby will become the father to the man,
The youth are free to do whatever they can.
The old will still have to trudge many a mile,
While the young will simply sit back and smile.

The wise will succumb to the silliness of youth,
Those respected will be attacked by the uncouth.
Those in doubt will assume an air of false pretense,
Those with certainty will fall into a well of suspense.

Lame philosophies will end up ruling the day,
Heightened spirituality will have nothing to say.
Rule of governance will tear apart at the seams,
Common civility will not know whatever it means.

Riddles will be served up as dinner of horse’s hay,
The cry of the cricket studied for what it has to say.
Incurable diseases will make people want to die,
Unanswered questions will set forth no fitting reply.

The crudest, crassest rap song will elicit a bow,
Designer names will dignify the heft of the plow.
The ignorant will proudly wear the gilded crown,
The liar and thief will discover a welcome renown.

The student will meet with the teacher’s gaze,
Stare back in defiance, to challenge and amaze.
The rich will be more enriched thru undue gain,
The poor will get poorer, with nothing to remain.

The spiritual world now lies firmly under siege,
Our world now threatened by the human liege.
The earth’s orbit round the sun will still persist,
As long as one honorable person will still exist.

Gone the time when the days are extravagance,
The illusion of living forever a form of arrogance.
Let us move cautiously in this time of end days,
Turn vice into virtue, and finally mend our ways.