Translucent amphibian or molecular
invertebrate, scavenging rodent
or stubborn ungulate, whatever
it is endures all manner of onslaught
for that imaginable unimaginable
forthcoming moment it’s the last thing
blinking and breathing in landscape
covered with almost comical
numbers of corpses, largely us, no
one living to analyze prayer as a form
of fluid dynamics or correlate lightning
to astral anomalies, no one remembering
the famed island let alone its tavern
where painters slugged each other
and how much a beer and shot cost,
no recalling terraced squatters’ shacks
of South America or the fact
ancient Egyptians believed frogs
emerged from flooding
and the coupling of land and water.