Lethargy.

It starts in a place very nearby to where you are now.

Maybe in an empty field with drying grass and a car shell,
where the cicadas scream
Somewhere close at hand,
finding water where you cannot.

Or,

In a lower-middle-class fringe suburb estate,
houses upon houses,
walls that scrape against neighbour's walls,
the smell of dog and Market Surplus soap.

Or maybe it's in the McMansion that your stepmother loves,
Quiet and cold,
Spotless in 'cream', 'champagne' and 'pearl white',
Buzz of nothing and silence in your ears.


This is where it comes from,
Although it seems to burn from within yourself,
The sense that the world is hurtling toward
That sinister word: "Finality",
And that you musn't be there
To witness it.