ONE HOPE

     Of course it is impossible to think
     We won’t pull back, though just before the brink
     Of the Apocalypse we’re headed for,
     Discovering some wisdom in our core
     Beneath the folly that has long prevailed,
     Against which prophets have forever railed
     And seemed ironically our destiny—
     Our Homo sapient insanity.

     How we’ll at last achieve this grand conversion
     Except by some baptismal immersion
     In Wisdom’s sacred font to cleanse our folly,
     Clearing our history of melancholy
     Is hard to see and harder to devise:
     And yet our only hope is to grow wise.

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