someone please pray

oh yes
there are bones
skeletons of dogs
and sheep,

signs of neanderthals!

 and yet the one impression that i keep
inside my favorite foundry mold
is of a long tall tale of being old
in an age of superlatives:
deadliest mass shooting
most post-hurricane looting

fires and piles of burning tires

a cancelled trip to the ruined Gaza strip

and i have a lot of others, sisters and brothers
because i'm working on the history of Man.
i see him crawling away from his trash can
artificially built up by reputation,
dreaming of a prolonged retirement vacation
with a modern holiday look

found between the pages of an advertisement book
claiming to know how all the marked cards are dealt

 i watch his party ice melt
and his furrowed forehead become warm

the hungry locusts swarm
underneath fingerprints of a transient god
who had been modeled originally in clay
oh yes
someone please pray

for the tasteless party tray

where he's snacking and fracking and coughing and hacking

all the way to the poor house without a scheme

to achieve a globally inclusive dream 

before the history of Man is over once and for all,

and my work takes a final curtain call.