If I am a world then the climate
is rapidly changing.
Gone now is the dodo,
gone druids, unicorns.
My coats tire of warning away
the full fire of the cosmos.
Through patches and holes
I am singed and boiled.
One of these days I will face
the sinking sun himself.
Continents drift without my permission.
There are tracks in the sea;
the great plates ride
on sandy rails
of unknown origin.
Who is he, this engineer who charts
where my heart will settle?
Icebergs bob like battleships
atop the warming ocean. Their sheer
hulls melt : cool water swells
to wash my white-hot belly.
photograph by Farley Vaughan
