Absolutes

​

Nothing is ever completely still.  It jitters

within as its energy begs for a way to transform,

generates heat and seeks to break its bonds;

there are agitants, and all it takes is one.

We were the first generation, the targets,

ignition of a thousand thousand unstoppable reactions,

crowds, clouds, burning rain, flesh sloughing

into trees; we knew, we cheered, we never dreamed

we would fall.  After all, those things are

self-contained – once begun, they have

nothing to do with us.  Nothing is quiescent,

satisfied.  Still.  It does not spill.  Cold.

Now we are old, and we forgot: to cool

is to fade toward death, the true chaos

that will see us spread, mere atoms again,

smears and specks once suns, soon

skin for another earth, not ours,

no longer.  We dreamed order

but did not grasp it.  Entropy will prevail.