Sometimes, I think about our future children
Who will grow up not knowing of the stars
Or of splashing in streams of childhood

But only
Black smog and masks
Filtering the poisons we have put
In our lungs

Will they find familiar
Dead animals, dead plants
A dead Earth?

I wonder
If they will be able to run in fields
Without glass between shrubs and on their feet?

Will they know a life?
Outside of the dystopia of our own making?

Meanwhile, here we sit
Living our lavish lifestyles
Not having a care about
Who dies in the process?

Do we not believe
The polar bear who drowned
From a lack of ice
Has a right to live as well?

Or the animals who starve
From humankind's greed
To eat lavish fish and exotic plants.

Do we not think twice
On pumping our plants
Full of toxins
That destroys every insect and ****
From the inside out
In our bodies?

Do we have no idea that eventually
Our land will hold heat so well
We may no longer dine
For everything is dead?

Or will we only care
When the melting ice
Has flooded our towns

Destroying brick homes
And picket fences with
Swingsets in the backyard.

Will it only matter
When we cannot grill meat
Produced from suffering

Or when there is no more profit to be made
From pumping our rivers with manmade monsters

Wonder about our future children
How will they grow
Living a life of disease and death.

But no, it will only matter
When us in the present start dying.

Even more, it will only be of importance
When it isn’t killing people across the world
But in our own homes.

It will not be significant
Until you lose a mother, a best friend
A lover, a child.

Sometimes I wonder about the children
And I apologize
For the life we have condemned them to.

A stranger who doesn’t fit anywhere on Earth
Something about her skin
Too dark to be white
Not dark enough to be her heritage.

A girl whose skin is too light
Her hair not black enough
A girl wearing American clothes
Living the American way.

Little mixed girl
Who doesn’t even speak the language
Of her grandfather

Fake little mixed girl
Who talks about being Indian
To actually feel connected
To her culture

Yet, she knows it’s a lie
She doesn’t celebrate Diwali.
She doesn’t know traditions

Little mixed girl
Who isn’t ethnic enough
To get offended over slurs

Fake little mixed girl
Who knows her ancestors
Look down upon her
Whitewashed self
And feel nothing but shame.

Fake little mixed girl
Pretending to be something she’s not.

Friends go to church on Sundays and girl sleeps in.
Friends wear tiny little crosses on their necks and she wears nothing.
Friends believe in a divine, arbitrary, God and she believes in nothing.

“She is more of a scientific girl,” she says.
“God created the universe,” they say.
“The Big Bang created the universe.”
“Well, why did the Big Bang happen?” They ask.
“Scientists do not know but it is not because of a God,” she says.

Yes, she turns to science and friends turn to their tiny pretty cross necklaces.
She likes science because science is reliable. science is consistent, does not forget, does not lie, does not exile you for making one mistake.

Maybe that is why she does not believe.
Not because she thinks herself above them.

But because she is afraid.

“Do not fall for tricks of the devil,” they say but she has fallen for the snake's lies many of times and relished in it every. single. instance.

She is Eve and has taken from the poison tree again and again.
That is why she is afraid.
Because if Heaven is real then she would go to Hell.

“God is all forgiving,” they say.

Lies, Adam and Eve ended up lying in a pile of broken promises and death at the end, didn’t they?

If God was so forgiving, would he forgive her for having more sins than she does hairs on her head?
If God was so forgiving would he forgive her for losing faith?
If God was so loving then why would he curse her with this fate?

If God believed in love, why doesn’t he love her? Why does he not love me?

It’s said that the human body replaces itself
With entirely new cells every seven years.

In seven years, I will be free from your touch.

In seven years your fingerprints will
No longer be burned into my skin.
In seven years I will be able to
Wash my body and finally feel clean.

In seven years I will be able to kiss
Without getting sick in a cold toilet,
Sobbing sobbing sobbing,
Because my tongue tastes of you.

In seven years, maybe I won’t
Lock my bedroom doors,
Fearing a monster that lives
Not under the bed.

In seven years, one more woman
Will pretend to feel free.