Fall to your knees under skies of blood

and worship the rains coming to sweep you away

As you drown in mud at the bottom of a grave

worship the plague doctor who throws dirt on your coffin

even though he sees you kneeling there, screaming

Breathe it in, your lungs can take it

Worship the hallowed earth

blessed by the dead who clawed their way to its surface

to walk in a world that waited for them

to bow their heads in communion with a harbinger of broken hope

mourning what never died

as they feast on graveyard dirt

Watch decay spread to the flowers on your grave

and as the withered petals fall away to dust

worship slow death and a dream of second chances

—

It’s hard to imagine people like Alexander the Great, Genghis Khan, Cyrus the Great, etc. in modern times—people who woke up each day thinking about how they could go about conquering the world. They’re still here, they’ve just gotten better at it.

—

Image by bernswaelz from Pixabay