The blue sky yawned

And out they came

As the mortal hoard 

Looked for blame

 

It's us! It's them!

It's God's fair hand

His silence broken

To make a stand!

 

Some cowered. Some ran

Some stood in awe

As tears of seeds

Filled Earth's floor

 

For exactly 6 hours

The seeds were sown

For the 7th

Time stood alone

 

Leaves stopped in flutter

Trees stopped in sway

And humanity stuttered 

As words lost their way

 

A small finger & thumb

Placed one upon tongue

The innocent curiosity

Only found in the young

 

And it satiated hunger

For savoury, and sweet

And whispered of health

To her heart's every beat

 

And as time drove on

They found of its uses

Hydration, clean fuels

There were no more excuses

 

But, some of great mind

With great belly's of greed

Chose to stockpile the last

Of the life-giving seed

 

Corporations of profit

And expedient lands

From ivory towers

Saw no blood on their hands

 

But, below, the world raged

Into famine, and war

As mankind revealed

They could learn never more

 

And temperatures rose

And glaciers fell

And islands were lost

To the oceans great swell

 

But the seeds had become

Part of sinew and bone

Part of water and soil

Part of our earthly home…

 

***

 

On a quiet, still, day

Under pale skies of blue

Reservoirs & lakes

Turned to black viscous stew

 

From crack & from crevice

Green shoots quickly sprung

And vines twisted snake-like

Around concrete they clung

 

The child, now a woman

Who'd placed seed upon tongue

Was the beginning of the end

For Humanity's brief run

 

As she looked from her garden

To purvey such a sight

She knew that the end

Of all days was in sight...

 

As her head slowly turned

To gaze at her Son

The evolution within

Had already begun

With every small step

Her legs flaked to wood

Her veins became vines

And sap replaced blood

Her face split & opened

Yawning out spores

Drifting up to the clouds

Awaiting new lores

Her Son could do nothing

But scream at the world

As Mankind's apocalypse

Slowly unfurled

 

Later, the sun 

Lit tinder-crisp bark

On things once of flesh

Now blackened and dark

The wind came with fury

And blew with all might

And a bushfire of souls

Flickered sparks in the night

And it raged until 

There was no lasting trace

Of a species once known 

 

As The Human Race

 

When the only sound heard

Was the wind's haunting moan

That sang to the embers 

And danced on its own

The spore-woven clouds

In skies of dark red

Cried tears of Genesis

Upon the ash of the dead

 

 

Stephen W Atkinson 2021