A Kulture's Kismet
In one of the myriad and dark abysses of our Universe, in a world wealthy with water, a culture is born. I call it a civilization.
They work, multiply, journey, explore, war, expand, and suffuse their little space of cosmos. They do all this not knowing their purpose.
Do they ever look up with longing and ask the big questions? I can’t say.
They know what drives them: to subsume, consume, excrete, and make more of themselves. To give off carbon and oxygen and fill all space with their aroma.
And I love this glorious race, throwing itself toward its singular aim, united by a zeal some might call fanaticism. But I admire it deeply.
In such strange ways, they make a slice of the universe entirely their own, after billions of generations, spreading to every corner of a tiny world. They reign unequaled.
And only then, in the zenith of their power, do they stop.
In the eminence and terminus of their being, when they have grown, glutted, converted… When they have breathed out and formed caverns… They sense their limit. They sense their death.
It is a tangible thing, unlike anything else that race has known before. They feel the heat. The Great Fire.
Pleasant at first, bringing the world to a comfortable eighty-five degrees fahrenheit (the temperature at which they thrive and multiply best). But it does not stop, shooting past one hundred, one fifty, two hundred, and beyond!
Conflagration from the heavens!
Burn, my precious culture!
Burn, my yeast!
You have turned dense dough into divine loaves. You have served your aim. And now you must perish inside my oven.
Burn, though great culture. Though great, enduring, stalwart, voluminous beings!
Burn but do not weep. For as I pull your lifeless remains out of the fire, and work my teeth through the spongy walls of your cities, I will shed a tear for you. So many have perished for a higher purpose. For a mystery. For my sustenance.
And I savor every crumb.
But then I stop, halting the gluten gnashing.
Stricken in a lightning moment, mired in time and place.
With heavy pondering, stifling longing, I leave my home.
And then, in the cold night air, under the glittering sprawl of heaven, waiting with eyes turned up… My heart will rise.
Away from the loud din of cities.
Up from our little world, wealthy with water and life.
Away from a culture. A civilization.
Away from the multiplying, consuming, excreting…
Up through our emissions, breaths, and effluvia.
Out of our small dark abyss in the infinite Universe.
Deep inside that space, beyond the veil of creation.
My eyes and heart will fall into that mystery.
And wonder…