People Are Dropping Dead and Nobody Cares

The morgue in Fresno is full and they keep dying. They are dying quietly in their homes in Queens, St. Louis, Oklahoma, as well as here in California. Scores are dying in France and the rest of Europe. While most of the dead are elderly, even the young and healthy are suffering and dying on the job.

If they were dying from fancy terrorist explosions, showy aerial bombardments by powerful nation-states, or the reproductive needs of a new virus, the world would take notice. There is a heatwave enveloping the globe, people are dying slowly and silently, and nobody much seems to care.

Heaven lasts long, and Earth abides
What is the secret of their durability?
Is it because they do not live for themselves
That they endure so long? ~ Lao Tsu

We are ignoring these deaths as much as we can because we know the cause is us and we don't want to admit it. We are afraid but it is a paralyzing fear because there is nothing we can do about it. So we ignore the truth around us and soldier on. Our lives are in the hands of our leaders, the greedy oligarchs who seek profit above all and see the whole of humanity as ants scurrying around a buried anthill. The photo below is of two children playing soccer on the grassy commons of Gerrard's Cross in rainy southern England.
Hecate has had several postings this week that discuss things far more eloquently than I can. The book Earth Abides is over fifty years old yet is still fresh and worth reading. As for me, I am obsessed by the thoughts that Gaia is simply running a fever. She will recover once she rids herself of the infection of humanity that plagues her. Religious fundamentalists should stop longing for Raptures and Second Comings when all we are seeing is a repeat of the Noah cleansing. The last time was flood, this time is fire.

Humanity has been astride this Earth for only a short time. It matters not whether we are a failed experiment, a species that could never stop its primal habit of shitting in our own nest, or just a huge disappointment to our Creator. A short time may be all we have earned.

tag: global warming, Climate Change