It's been almost ten years since
I wrote that violence was imminent
The guns in our classrooms, and hate towards the immigrants.
We're more divided now than ever before
And the horrible future ahead means war.

It obvious that we haven't been studying because,
1.5° Celcius doesn't sound like such a scary thing until,
you see the flames coming towards you down the hill,
And there's not enough water in the reservoirs to win.

So, we're cutting funding here and there
Anything to avoid taxing the billionaires
What good is an education anyway now
That AI can take all those dreams away

We offshored the factories, might as well send off the tech
We'll ban the apps we don't like, so we can get a bigger check
Tarrif the food supply, and deport all the farmhands
Jack up the rent in cities, and buy all the private land

The wheat will stop growing soon, and The white house is a circus tent, so
When there's no bread left to break, then
What's the point of these sycophants?

The days feel like a fleeting eternity
Watching the sun carry us along
Like a stone caught in the flow of a river
Time slowly dissolving our bones

Sand slipping through the cracks of my fingers
I'm trying to hold on to something too small
A reason to keep going is fickle in this world
When just being alive isn't enough on its own.

I can sense the reaper coming
I've seen what's happening all around me, our livelihoods crumbling, the hospitals crowding, and debt climbing to the sky.

I can hear the reaper coming
I watched as fascists screamed on camera to roaring applause that it's the immigrants fault, cause they're taking your jobs.

I can feel the reaper coming
I saw flashing lights on a screen that symbolized a number of deaths so large that it starts to lose meaning, so we focus instead on Luigi.

I can smell the reaper coming
I looked past my phone when I caught a whiff of desire for something more, but the view outside was disturbing, so I'd rather be alone.

I can taste the reaper coming
I was eyeing up this platter when the bittersweet taste of pleasure was swept away by the overwhelming panic I feel while in public.

I've been so distracted through the years that the glaze over my eyes might be permentantly there, but I hate being so blind as much as I hate asking you if...
Is the reaper here?

Sweat drips into gasoline pipes, the
Burning in my stomach causing
Noxious fumes clouding the sky, as
Acid rains down on my tongue, while
Chewing on black rubber, but
Don't swallow your sorrows, remember
Steer clear of the profits, that
Promise a better tomorrow, see
The fruit of knowledge is bittersweet
And all of these people gotta eat, so
We'll carve through the rock and blood
Black skeletons soaking in sin
To keep our treats in refrigeration
There's little man hasn't already done.

Time passes like clouds in the sky
Lessons cycle like white spirals
Twisting deeper into my mind
Carving passion into canyons
Hobbies become habits or
Potential into careers
Joy into sadness or
Love into tears
All the while
My children
Won't stop
Growing
Up

I know these words need not to rhyme
Yet the sound rings out as if divine
Hands wrung out the blood in my heart
Spilling love onto white and making it art

We've traveled the world and seen so far
Across oceans of water and to the stars
Past peaks of earth that scrape the sky's
Through the struggles and doubt of just getting by

You've attracted me like a moth to flame
A light in the garden that paints the way
You're the moon to my midnight, the rays on my petals
You're the reason I fight, to put down my devils

This feels so right, knowing that Alexandrite
Changes in the light from purple to green
It seems like we were always meant to be
So I'll never let go, if you'll marry me?

Blades cut back to the roots
Forced us to start fresh
Like the waning moon
Or the sun when it sets

From frost to morning dew
Life wakes from its rest
Seeds grow into shoots
Surviving winters test

Cycles begin anew
Like babes to a breast
Or when flowers bloom
On Persephone's dress