Mayflies

One of these days, the sky is going to open up
And the heavens will cascade down…probably
It’s inevitable, isn’t it?
The world will crumple like tissue paper – none of this was designed to last
The ecosystems, the cities, us
Even the sky, reaching endless over our heads, is just a thin film of air clinging to our spinning rock as we hurtle through space
Can you imagine?
Nothing, around us, is going to last
None of this will survive for long – comparatively
Isn’t that wild?
We are so fleeting, mayflies dancing
– that one moment in late autumn when the weather is perfect for just a week before winter kicks in
Humanity will have a winter too, eventually
We were just not meant to live forever
Even just breathing! In and out – oxidisation kills us while keeping us alive.
What a world we live in
What a life we have been given
We live inside the moment of a bubble that hasn’t yet popped-
Swirling oils make rainbows, across the surface of something too unstable and yet-
This is the moment the universe has given us
This beauty, this joy, this wonder, this love? All these experiences…
And yes
One of these days the sky will be washed away by solar winds, and humanity might not even be around to witness it
So why don’t we at least witness now – anything and everything we can
Because maybe we are the last generation before the ice caps melt completely
Or the last to have this standard of international produce
Probably the last generation before something irreversibly terrible cascades across our world
– and I live in fear and grief for that
God.
Each of these moments may be the last – of something, even trivial, something
But, they will also continue
Somehow, to be a first of something, too
Life, and death, two sides of a coin
And to mourn as new flowers also bloom – is that not what it is, to be human?
No, more than that
Is that not what it is
To stand on this ever-rolling stone, of dust and nitrogen and electricity
And watch, marvelling, at the beauty of these ephemeral, fleeting swirls of colour
That this bubble of existence has created?
That in this moment, is just for us
And what a view it is