APOLOGY

Between Helene and Milton,

there was a few more billion dollars

going to arm an additional war

in yet another country

My grandchildren, I apologise

in advance

to you and your children

And you know what!

You ought not to accept

my apology

I apologise

For being an obedient citizen,

giving in

to the Internal Revenue Service’s boogie men

For standing back in silence,

filing my tax return

without a peep and on time

For saying

the laws don’t allow otherwise

For accepting

that only a slim percent of my taxes

is going to be spend

on Carbon capturing

or air filtering

or Sun dimming

or stratospheric controlled experiments

For knowing that

my tax bills are rolled into bullets,

murdering tens of thousands innocents

with the pretence of getting

“The terrorists”

For my generation’s mighty leaders,

who we elected, failed to understand

-or understood but did not care-

that loss and despair will

morph into terrorism

That spilling more blood

will birth more monsters

and not the other way around

I apologise for not standing up

to your right to be born

On an Earth without a storm after storm

On an Earth without scorching sun

or rising seas

or melting ice

And you know what!

You ought not to accept my apology,

not even a bit of it.