Did fires burn through the last ancient woodland? Boughs that breathed the air before us, Reached deep into soil our fingers never touched. Did another year’s harvest collapse to rot? Fields empty of corn, barley, wheat, wild things, Nimble hands to pluck soft fruit. Did oil slicks stain the sickening seas? Glaciers’ ghosts rising haunt new shores And the forests beneath bleached to bone. When you watched the last tiger pace in her cage And migrating birds plunge from the sky, Did they say it was just two degrees? Did disease edge its way to your lungs, to your brain, Did exhaust fumes get to you first? Did you sweat in bed as they piled up the dead Or breathe the fresh air of before? Where crickets sing in the undergrowth And above, a billion wings soar.
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