An Ode to a Preventable Future

Formerly titled "An Ode to A Wasteland"

when Prometheus granted the fire to the squandered human souls
was he aware of what we would do with those coals?
Did he see the fiery depths that haunted humanity’s future
and decide this future we could suture?

Suture with the fire that would make poison gas
and then it would burn, burn, burn it all to ash.
Did Prometheus see how the Earth would shake
and decide that that was his risk to take?

It is a shame humanity was given fire,
a shining light on our abundant lack of ire. 
a mockery of the gift Hestia thought meant home and hearth,
the burning forests giving home to the only warmth.

Greek myths and stories did not warn of us today,
history rewritten in a repetitive play,
The viewers are bored of this constant drone,
A better show they wish to be shown,

Not one so base as this.
Repeat, repeat, repeat this kiss
of deathly heat and harm,
It was meant to be comforting, not this violent storm.

An ode to a Wasteland, a proper name,
an ode to the future that longs for fame,
Regretful repetition once again
in the long story of earthly Abel and fiery Cain.

I’m sorry, dear Mother, who made the Earth a home,
that we have come to steal its bones.
I’m sorry, dear Mother, who made us first, 
that we have done something so accursed

that the thought of making it better
burns out the thinker
and all that’s left is doom and gloom
and the cruel children eating – no, burning – their way out of their mother’s womb.