Flames rip through us

Dreams ground into dust

Enough ghosts roaming

To swallow the earth whole

If only they breathed

The same air as the living

The sky hangs dark

And thick with tragedy

Hope glints like distant stars

You squint to see any of it

You reach your arm out to fit just one

Into the frame of two fingers

At just the right angle

You lean into the illusion

That it’s still within reach

You tell me you’re crazy

I tell you I know

You see it in me too

So you pull me close

To kiss the missing parts in you

You wander through your heavy house

The walls are screaming

You can tell by the way the paint is peeling

Bursting with memory and feeling

Years spent off balance

Has sent it all reeling

Art to cover the walls

And hands to cover your ears

You try to explain what it is that you hear

When night falls and the wind blows

Carrying the message

of the weight of the world

It whips flames through our homes

Manufacturing early graves

Toppling trees and battling with the seas

It whips blood flow into our cheeks

Begging for an audience

Wake up! It pleads

But no one will hear it

The world keeps burning

We stare at screens and fan the flames

We consume and we are consumed

Look for little pleasures to give it all measure

What’s a life worth building

When you can’t see through the smoke

Build anyway and watch it shatter?

Or patiently wait for the ashes to scatter

And start again