i open the news each day
like the idiot crew member in a sci-fi Hollywood space movie
who unlocks the hatch before the cabin has been
depressurized and is sucked out into deep space
ashamed, drifting,
useless

the light, blindingly bright
blindingly bright
like exiting a matinee into mid-afternoon sun bright
when at once your eyes close, your head turns away
and your hands raise themselves to shield your eyes
vulnerable, as you wait for your dilated pupils to constrict

before Jim Hansen, Al Gore, Bill McKibben
or carbon parts per million
back when the nuclear holocaust was still the rage
just decades
after the actual holocaust
blinded the world
blinded the world

we never forget
until we can
until we do
until we forgot
if we acted
or didn’t

are
or aren’t
were
weren’t
blind
deaf
silent

as if it wasn’t happening
as if it hadn’t happened
as if it hadn’t come.

© r.s.greene
February 8, 2023