The Death Of Wonder Poem by Percy Dovetonsils

It had always been taken for granted
and seemed it would always be there
so its extinction wasn’t noticed
for some time.

What happened
late in the present century
was that almost everything
worth wondering at
or about

had been eaten.
Even the Chinese,
who had always been ready to eat
everything and anything
found, at last, that their markets
were absent of live, caged,
turtles, pangolins, songbirds, scorpions,
because there were none.

And the Congolese
who had been remorselessly
devouring bushmeat
came to the last
head and hand
of macaque, capuchin, chimp,
and said, regretfully, “No more, ”
not because there were no more
but because there were no more to eat.

No more forests,
no more skies or seas
or even weather
worthy of the name.

Just weeds and disturbances.
And industrialized
flora and fauna
designed to be eaten.
Perhaps if a child
had peered into a microscope
or telescope
it could still
have beheld
something
wonderful.

But by then
even children
were only thinking about
their next meals.
Wonder was an undiscovered country
or rather, a lost continent.

It would take
the extinction of our species
to recover it.