The World’s an Ashtray – hour 22, prompt 22

The world’s a giant, sooty ashtray

holes in walls, with smoke-black stains

our sins, the earth’s full burning pain

the trash, we dump in bucket loads

glass on sidewalks and crushed in roads

they cut the ground with fractured nodes

each hole spies a different window

where shadows lurk, and poisons go

or ghosts of once a rugged life

got tired and offed his scathing wife

then he himself, with stabbed knife

graffiti it will sometimes be

the smoking offal of gangs and rings

drugs, they rot people about

smacked loves and lives near inside-out

drunks they wreck the homes and highways

then steal the lives of others‘ days

pollution, the final slow demise

as it kills our land and skies

and construction, always promising trees

I know that I will never see

land finally will a desert be

and burning, screaming volcanoes

will torch what’s left in fiery throes

when ashes cool and finally mend

creation can begin again.

-Sandra Johnson

(Muse photo courtesy of Unsplash)

 

 

10 thoughts on “The World’s an Ashtray – hour 22, prompt 22

  1. Terrific poem! Love ekphrastic and this pic inspired you well to you cover so many sins of the world. Made me glad I am celebrating 10-years smoke-free. Helping me, helping the planet. Thanks for writing this and sharing it!

    1. Jrturek I celebrated 10 years smoke free just this past November. I’m glad we’re making this world a cleaner place just from our 10 plus years of cigarettes combined! Thanks for reviewing!

  2. Hi Sandi! The first line of this poem is absolutely brilliant! It punches the reader in the gut, and you can’t look away from the rest of the poem. It’s dystopian, but all too true and too real a picture of the world we’re living in. Throughout, you keep the mood that first line established. And the last line is that perfect little ray of hope after cataloging the “world’s sins”: “when ashes cool and finally mend, creation can begin again.” Great job with this!

    I’d love it if you reviewed some of my poems, too!
    https://thepoetrymarathon.com/blog/author/bethf1128

  3. Hi Sandi! The first line of this poem is absolutely brilliant! It punches the reader in the gut, and you can’t look away from the rest of the poem. It’s dystopian, but all too true and too real a picture of the world we’re living in. Throughout, you keep the mood that first line established. And the last line is that perfect little ray of hope after cataloging the “world’s sins”: “when ashes cool and finally mend, creation can begin again.” Great job with this!

  4. Thanks- It’s becoming clear that this one is going to be one of the two I’m submitting to the anthology. I’m trying to decide which of the others I’ll choose – let me know what you think of Ode to Light.

    I’ll be happy to look at yours. 👍

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