Alt-Ctrl-Delete

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R._N._Taber

Update (May 2016): Today’s poem was written in 1998 and first appeared in the CC&'D magazine, Scars Publications (USA) 1999. Scars now publish issues through Amazon which are printed in the U.K. and Europe. Given that Scars are now able to release it internationally, hopefully contributors and interested readers can enjoy ordering hard copies without paying an insane shipping price for mailing from the States any more. Interestingly, Scars publishes only non-rhyming or blank verse; they have published some 50+ of my poems since the late 1990's which is a healthy poetic exercise for me as I usually use rhyme a lot.  More information about Scars at: http://scars.tv/ccd.htm

This poem springs to mind whenever I am at the keyboard of my computer along with the constant threat to global as well as personal survival with which we all live daily thanks to humankind’s general complacency regarding Green issues.

ALT-CTRL-DELETE

Blank screen staring at me
like a dead man's eye
as if taken by surprise
at the moment of execution,
expecting pulse, heartbeat,
a flow of blood to the works
in spite of those quirks
of human nature that put a body
on hold whenever its world
ceases to turn, all civilisation
gone to ash and dust, leftovers
of personal ambition

From inspiration, no help
to guide pen or brush;
Desolation, a lush wading
through risen waters
of the earth, baring pain
like a rose its petals
in acid rain, deserving better
at Nature’s hand
than a travesty of imitation driven
by Man’s jealousy of God
if only for being free of chains
(no human being exempt)

As melting ice caps start to flood
this world of ours, we can lose heart,
drown in its worst nightmares
(poet found dead at the keyboard)
or find a voice...

Our choice

Copyright R. N. Taber 2001, 2012

[Note: An earlier version of this poem appears in Love and Human Remains by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books, 2001.]