The Rains of Greenland

August 20th, 2021. A young person hears the news of the first rains ever recorded over Greenland’s glaciers.

What are those footsteps lighting on the ice,
who find it irresistible to stain
the immaculate whiteness of the glaciers
like children meeting snow for the first time?
Why does such a strange, alluring pleasure
with terrifying things always combines,
so horror on its own does not suffice,
as now with such a soft and purling sound—
or hush, for what I hear is a shushing
of the dreams of slumbering ice: this is rain
falling with such confused ease on Greenland
as tears released in wind, and the skies shroud
as though the world has darkened in mourning.
At ten thousand feet there should have been snow—
now’s a rainy day: gray, silent, and warm.

Like gangrenous tissue the ice goes black,
and the gates of frost no longer hold back
the restless seas eager to break their chains,
and still they tick, the clock hands of the rains…

Why then within the shadow of my hood
from my trembling lips demented smiles peek,
inexorably growing cheek to cheek,
and sudden laughter shreds my fearful mood?

I am no longer human: for a face
I have a gas mask. I am the new race,
more demon than man for this kindled hell,
the worm who remained once empires fell,
who from their corpse found purpose and delight
when oceans of fire were burning bright!
For whom the old way of life meant boredom,
thus my wings in raging storms cry: Freedom!