We were given a lovely world
but we trampled it and mashed it
beat it up and trashed it,
nobody else to blame
we did it to ourselves
and it's such a ****** shame,
we can't walk away,
we can't say I quit
we made this awful mess
now we have to live in it

A mendacious murmuration
  of black pixels dance a fractal fandango
  against the pale pink sky
telling you that all is well with the world.
A susurration of complacency–
  above the exhaust-scented streets
  of Birmingham’s melting asphalt–
whispers, “Don’t worry,
ignore the heatstroke starlings
dropping from the sky
onto viscous pitch dark bitumen”.

Miley and I walk down the street
      ignoring the cannabis scented clouds:
      she stops – sniffing every urinated message,
      occasionally leaving a reply.

My dog passes the laughing gas canisters,
    polystyrene boxes and broken glass
    searching for discarded bones, bread and tissue paper
      to eat, rip or claw.

We stroll through the park
      once yellow smiling daffodils grin brown and withered.
Squirrels multiply – fecund rats in the trees,
      Miley too slow to control the rodent population.

Despite urban desolation
      look harder:
        see the green canopy
            grass, birds,
              sometimes even a butterfly.

The world isn’t dead –
      we still have time.

In sleet and rain of Edinburgh
a cathedral rises from the deeps.
The salt of sea and old coal blur
veil her face in grey-cast sheets.

On her western pediment
within tympanum carved of stone
sits Christ triumphant and in judgement
where he calls us all to atone.

I stand before him, my head bowed
as I contemplate our shared guilt,
with mea culpas weighing on my brow
for the follies fallen man has built.

And so we’re burning Eden down
with flaming swords that we still wield
as once vast forests shrink and brown
and fallow lie once verdant fields.

Where trees once stood, smokestacks rear
their heads belching fumes up high
and in the deeps, the oceansphere’s
no more a garden for octopi.

For in this our earthly commonweal
that was a gift that’s given free
we prove that purgatory’s real
because we ourselves have made it be.

A whisper came from the carved face
to walk into this stony womb
where colored light and incense trace
a path to overcome the gloom:

Forgiveness for our many faults
comes when we change our ways.
There in this temple’s holy vault
I vow to fight Eden’s decay.

In Edinburgh I found Eden
in a vision of what can be.
For we are by no means beaten
and we can do it, you and me.

When the changes come
will winter winds still blow?
What world will we see
as quicksilver higher flows?
When this time is past
will songbirds still be heard?
Will parents still tell children
of the bees and the birds?
Will grandchildren know about
lightning bugs in the dark?
Will lovers still know what’s meant
by butterflies in their hearts?
May those gifts that we leave
for those who come hereafter
not become the close
of this book’s final chapter.

Today I saw brown mountain peaks touching the sky and what a grand sight it was,
As I was humbled by the silence of greatness that doesn't need to shout.
As I was mystified by the rolling valleys beneath.
The mountains, so eerily vast and huge made me feel nervous about my silly human apprehensions.
Time has tested the fate of these mountains, their  peaks still don't bend to anyone.
An eagle flew between these great walls, as if taking a casual evening stroll.
I wonder if the bird admires the beauty in the stillness of these earthly structures.
I wish I could be the eagle, flying as high as the top of the hills, as if conversing and chatting with them.
The mountains are obviously not made of smooth rocks and unmarked skin,
Their surface and body have stories to tell.
If you notice, there are rocks on the mountain chest making a pattern just like ocean waves, creating a painting upon a painting of God.
The limestone that flows so easily on the back of the mountain, like beautiful hair let down.
And the curves on top, the bends on its peak,
The mountain is not a triangle.
It's a woman sleeping peacefully,
Do not disturb her,
For she is She is mother Nature...
She embodies the mountain spirit and has great power.
Do not disturb her,
For she is our mother Earth.
Soon, light gets stolen from the blue skies
As stars come to their job shift, it's now their time to shine.
When the moon rises behind the mountain peaks, the cosmic body feels smaller than the hills.
It becomes the cherry on top of the cake,
It becomes the eye of the mountain.
As the hills breathe and rest,
The soil beneath  ever shifting and changing.
The mountains have been crafted over a thousand of years through storms and rain and dust and water.
A thousand years after I die, the mountains will still be there.
Brown peaks touching the sky,
Undefeated and unconquered.
And I will be the eagle flying between the mountain peaks.

The drab
brown butterfly
sits on a white blossom
incautiously drinking honeyed
poison.

poisoned seas
hillsides with welts where once stood trees

parched grasslands
streams encased in concrete

i feed my pampered pets
on ground up factory farmed meat

oil oozes from dark bruises
we drill to fuel our runaway machines

the life that once fecund swarmed
now flaccid, sparse, and malformed

going...
going...

gone