Friday, August 30, 2024

For a While They Were So Dominant, and Then They Just Burned Out

Hush in the assonance of dusk,
Herbert concluded. When I am

Gone what will you do? / Who will write
And draw for you? asked Silverstein.

The experts on eurypterids
Puzzle sea scorpion fossils,

Wondering how they could have been
So successful then quietly

Extinct—possibly the record
Is incomplete, or possibly

The gigantism enabling
Their long, globe-girdling migrations

Also doomed them. Other humans
Spend less time studying the world

And more time talking back to it,
As if it ever talked to them.

They apostrophize like crazy,
Addressing unresponsiveness

As a way of finding comfort,
As a way of making displays

To try to impress each other.
This may be part of their success,

To bravely address the cosmos,
This trait that may also doom them.

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