| O world! O time! (May 27, 2003) O world! O time! Plot the points, and here I am today, in crosshairs marked by ambivalent, amoral lines that intersect in this place, at this moment. The pirates have wrested the planet and nurturing hands have been displaced in favor of pickaxes and drill bits. The cyclical path has been abandoned; the regenerative order has been annihilated, with the thumb of progress on the detonator. O hope! O future! Which way to turn when whirlpools abound, when the roiling sea encircles our feet and tidal waves move in from the horizon? We cannot swim forever, and we cannot fly at all. As the deluge rises we can only regret our choice not to seek higher ground. Kleptomaniacs have filched most everything and right before our eyes: the air, the dirt, the trees, the stones, rivers, lakes and oceans, plants and animals. Nothing has been left untouched, unmanaged, unprocessed, unsold, and we have watched without objecting, often giving our sweat and blood to the enterprise. O conscience! O heart! I must turn inward. I seek your counsel as the waters rise, as the sky burns, as the planet shakes with fury. This world, this time has been torn away from me; all hope, all future has been co-opted and put up for sale. My thoughts, my feelings are all that I have, all that I want, and all that I need as I venture off toward more lofty terrain, and there I will seek out the questions that this world and this time pose. |