Across The Metaverse

Abject frustration bleeds into search terms

are people becoming stupid

not more stupid or stupider.

My cheeks, hollowing out

should my bones show 

as posh, haughty,

and come before the eye rings,

deflect from these dark

moments in the server

or my concerned look

from behind the blinds

for the pink haired teen

who walks past and hasn't

realised it's cold out.

She could be tough,

or oblivious, or doesn't care 

but this is not

evidence of decline.

I see new things and think

well, yes, in the wrong hands,

but whose hands, 

mine?

I'm texting friends

and asking about legacy.

It's unfair that this is it, now,

our leavings,

sickening seeds.

I feel cheated out of not under my watch

because what should I have watched out for,

kairos time just couldn't have wished to meet

its chronos of the same grim predictions pulling back

to -

it's me, in 1999, 

I'm searching for,

ready to be ripened by choice,

to be burst by choice and draw

power in choice, 

choice,

maddened by it,

me

in 1999,

scrawny quarry leading a merry dance, 

alone,

through Europe into the sea.

I'll run my dogs to death,

shame a crew into certain doom

at the north west passage,

because if there is ever a chance

to look and see

The Creature, floating away on an ice raft

never to be seen again,

in whose wrong hands, mine, 

held the chicken and the egg.