The dead stalk,
	and the other deadnesses
			surround us.  Dead

		shark, dead walrus.  Dead
		mahi mahi.  Matthew, honey,

get off the beach, this sand ain't
	fit to breathe,
			and one of those filthy waves

will get you from behind
	(If I said you had a beautiful
			body, would you hold it

against me?).  Now they're photographing
	the last manatee,
			there near those filigree

roots of the last
	mangrove tree
			Bill Wordsworth's bones

do a double take     Where he walked,
	counting the syllables,
			the tread of caterpillars

bulldozing a firebreak, and who will
	pay the bill, Jill, for there is
			a free lunch,

if you can keep it down,
	and now ladies
			please take those crying babies

		outside the auditorium):

tears are heard within the harp

and here we sit, snug in our single family
		dwellings.  It just that
				there's this fire
		
		burning in the alley
		behind the high rise
		into the suburb
		down the interstate
		over the river and through

		the tundra

flames, my friends and fellow countrymen,
		crawling the floor
			of that once deep sea