The Abandoned Planet

This is a dark and somewhat depressing poem, I suppose. There's an element of ambiguity in it - is it our world or an alien planet? It's a Wellsian take on matters, looking at trends, and in this case, the worst effects of climate change on any planet, especially one where the inhabitants live and think such short lives, such short term solutions, and try as they might, seem unable to escape those chains of self-interest.

The Abandoned Planet

Standing here in the ruins, we look out,
And wonder at these people, no doubt
Great and noble civilisations, but wasted,
And what they thought as they raced
Headlong into destruction, year by year,
Torn between their greed and their fear;
Our star ship stands by the wrecked land:
Concrete structures engulfed by sand,
As successive heat waves made them leave,
So suddenly, not even time to grieve;
Air conditioning failed, a city met its end:
Beyond their control, no longer could amend,
And fix this broken planet, where the heat
Made a desert, water resources they deplete,
And eventually the machine stops. It’s over:
No place for exodus, no place for passover;
And there is also a drowned world, the rain,
Coming from mountains, across the plain,
Washing away fields, houses, everything:
Wailing and grief, survivors mourning sing;
And they prepare to pack and so depart;
But where to go? For Gaia’s broken heart,
Has extremes: rain and flood, heat and dust,
And all their precious treasures turn to rust;
Hurricane winds, tearing the land asunder;
Storms, raging lightening, roaring thunder;
Monsoons breaking apart the river banks;
And warfare: bombs, missiles and tanks;
Dying by slow degrees, death in many cuts,
As the planet brakes, spews out its guts;
And plague reaches out, a deadly touch:
The tipping point: when it is too much;
And now we visit from our distant star,
Who have heard the signals, come far,
Across the gulf of space, oceans of light,
To the abandoned planet, a dark night;
Only bones remain of this proud race,
And even that will be dust, not a trace,
To be left, as concrete crumbles away,
And dust blows in the wind that day.