Tonight's Poet Corner: Twenty-First Century

Twenty-First Century
by Belinda Roddie

The end of days
began with lizards
birthing themselves
from pits of lava.

They could withstand
all heat, and so'
the snakes and they
took over both
the Hawaiian islands
and the Florida Keys.

The end of days
continued with
mild-mannered people
confessing to be vampires
on Instagram, before they

sucked the blood from
the necks of significant
others, who had fetishized
the act long, long ago.

The end of days
progressed once the
Nordic gods convened
at a Round Table pizza,
debating both how to

eradicate Canada,
as well as whether or not
anchovies deserved their place
on a standard pizza pie.

And finally, the end of days
concluded with a kiss beneath
Mount Vesuvius, where Pompeii
had been fossilized and where

Herculaneum sealed lovers
like us in rock and magma.
Somehow, their silver rings
still shone. Gold had lost
its luster before the eruption.