Almonds and vines and lawns
drink up the last
of shallow, short-term water
then suck on the black depths
with a draw mightier
than the moon’s. And suck.
In sudden places the ground
puckers and caves.
Far westward, China smokes.
Nobody sees the rains fail
until they have.
Tableland mesas crack.
In the mountains the snowpack thins,
meltwater now brown
reluctant drops.
Cities gasp in the sun’s stare.
Faucets cough
and families turn inwards.
There must be somebody to blame.
Better ourselves than no-one.
We brag
of damage done
but whether we could truly
dry all rain, bake all earth,
science does not know.
The wastefulness was all
ours but this fetid heat
could be a planetary
impersonal adjustment
like an ice age,
so it might well be wise
to keep always
facepaint and ash about us.
When the last clouds
wagon-train off,
loincloth and invocation will be
the one hope for last
woman and last man discovering
she’s pregnant.
