EXTINCTION (I).................................................................................................................................................E.A. BAGBY

RUNNER UP

Extinction (I)

Poem by E.A. Bagby

Cyanobacteria in primeval waves found the young planet so immensely to their liking that they multiplied and multiplied— those carbon-gluttons at an endless feast— spread, turned oceans blue, and forced the world

to breathe

From which it all followed: legs grew, and nerves and spines, fins, wings, antennae, tails; monocots pushed up, leaves uncurled; meadows flamed with color, brought forth the humming seethe

of bees; and, not incidentally, some enterprising double-jointed ape stretched out a fingertip and touched a thumb, and found the world was less obscure

—from which the rest of it proceeded: wars and Romans, contrapposto, dancing, letters, A-tests, pyramids and satellites, gunpowder, rock and roll, vaccines, banner ads, whisky, card games, fantasy leagues, traffic stops, Congress: well, here we are.

Did, as cyan crept across the swells, as the holocaust of oxygen filled the air, some skeptical bacterium demur?

Did it assert, The oceans aren’t changing; or, if they are changing, you can’t prove that we’re the ones changing them; and anyway, why stop progress, when cyanobacteriakind has come so far?

E. A. Bagby, a Chicago-based writer, musician, performer, and illustrator, recently participated in the Arctic Circle Arts & Sciences Expedition, an arts residency aboard a tall-mast ship exploring the glaciers and fjords of Svalbard. Her writing has appeared onstage with Strange Tree Group and Sansculottes; in anthologies from Wipf & Stock, Press 53, and Chicago Review Press; and in numerous magazines. She also draws oddball creatures for The Forgiveness Monster, fronts Liz + the Baguettes, and plays bass for The Unswept.