And Then What’s Left Is All That’s left

As if there were an inch of this ranch
That had belonged to another world,
Once or twice upon a time, that had

Had the foresight to go underground
When underground had been doable,
That had not waited until this late

To imagine a bridge between dreams
Of escape and the means to escape—
A thought of every escapist,

Retrospective wish of refugees
Around the globe for who knows how long—
That there used to be a time when this

Was possible or, at any rate,
More possible than it has become.
Best wishes for fletching that arrow.

The last demographic continues
To grow until a day comes it can’t—
That’s all extinction is, anyway,

The day that the last demographic,
The portion of a population
That is owned by death, runs out of fuel.