the stress
of this thing
is heavy like a  
weighted blanket
casting blue shadows
across crispy kindling-dry
landscapes of the world's future
with a grey thunderhead towering
to the invisible foothills of olympus
miniaturizing all i've ever been
and all i could ever hope to be
while gut-churning claps of
deafening news follow the
terror-bright disease;
luminous arteries
that reach down
from heaven
to char the
earth