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If you have listened,
maybe you have chanced to hear --

the earth;

through inner light;
in subtle spasm,
as her molten core
still burns...

amid her darkest days,
as relentlessly --
she dies in turns;

she gropes in pain;
a spell to which she's bound,
with no relief...
within her sight

there's none --
to help undo
the lasting damage done;
in shrouded shameful
shadowed night,

as she throws up her
clouds in grief,
as if she's lit
distress' bright flare;

as they whose apathy
she's known...
admit the waste --
upon her glare;
that carelessly
they've thrown ...

toward the heavens,
yet back, to fall upon
this stepping stone
in ill repair.

True comrades --
rescuers of fate,
bedfellows that ignite;
so great...

so unaware...
those hopeful vessels,
grander than the ocean's lair;

thus try to answer
signals where...

it may just be,
the last decree;

the cry for help
that came too late;

as she now writhes,
in fitful agony...

as crying whales
now offer themselves
to their slim hosts
false gods who kill;

and birds, who once
soared high,
no longer fly; fall ill --
so sick;
and walk the puddles
thick with crud,
or drink in oceans --
slick... with oil;

as tides now roll and roil,
on high, in angry red,
announcing loud --
impending dread;

like traffic lights,
hung there to say
what no one ever
should have said...

turned yellow,
never to be green --
foreboding sign:
she'll soon be dead;

a ship no longer sound,
her beacon sadly blinking...

as anger grows,
among her dying
breath of wind --
that barely blows;
within her wilted soul,
amid the farmer's
once-stout rows;

and she at last, now knows:
her mantle suffered deadly blows;
and she is done
with all her thinking.

Her creatures, once true friends,
now fight;

alone --

in deep despair of blight;
these children she's been weaning;
as each and ev'ry watchful cloud,
now thunders penitent sorrows loud,
as if they seem contrite.

Her skies belie
the wispy thread,
now frail and brittle --
acid raindrops tears they shed;
her seams now frayed --
a shelf lined bare;

more frail than silk
instead;

her vilest foes
now flocking there:
inside her seas,
a once and sheltered
reef of care --
in deepest blues;

and in her skies;
discov'ring now --
the saddest news:

that once and mighty heart,
they used to share,
lies battered, torn and bruised;
and bleeding now;
with constant, ceaseless weeping --
and precious lifeblood's endless seeping --

through ...

to places from which
there's no turning back;

adieu.

no way to wake from this --
the final fatal sleeping.

Copyright (c) Jeff Mason Hollow Spectres / The Awakening