We never really managed
to kill the apocalypse myth
because no person, having seen it
would live without their mirror image.
The reflective prophecy of our destruction
was hidden,
not in the metaphor
of some biblical scroll
but simply
in the written record of human history
in it’s shadow, those people
who do not get to write it.
In there,
you will find
the silence of god
has many different levels to it.
In the space of half an hour:
a Somali militant is obliterated
by some pale drone,
his cause,
whatever its content,
goes unheard
even by its opponents.
Another child starves in Yemen
the ground trodden underfoot
by black hooves stampeding
taking care in their rush,
not to disrupt the balanced scales.
Elsewhere
a Ukrainian
finds the promised borders have shifted
for the terms ‘ally’ and ‘welcome’
as his visa application is rejected.
He is now the first line in a rhyming couplet,
yet to complete itself,
that will sing the song
of the sixth: Catastrophe.
He finds that all too soon
the sounds of human suffering
reaches beyond the register
of the Human ear
that the words needed
to describe him
as a person
will join names like ‘Gaza’
and ‘Damascus’
as the silently pronounced words
of an Imperial eschatology.
All this
contained within thirty minutes
neatly ordered
like some underworld descent.
All of it
as intended.
And
as the last quiet trumpet
of the seventh seal
comes unfurled
we’ll just play Cowboys
and ‘Indians’
till the end of the world.
