Star-Stealers

They've come at last, the stealers of stars, From their travels afar, With their muck-spewers, tree-hewers, earth-movers, Beer, axes, guns, grenades, deer on skewers. They burp and belch and blaspheme While they drunkenly dig and demolish The earth and urinate on it in rings. They dip some Skoal and spit out their folly After licking it up with their wagging tongues, After beating their wives and slapping their young, And jump into their Cats again, fat and jolly. They've come back from Iraq, After that country's plunder and sack, After they'd crossed the Atlantic desert, Evaporated by their steam and hurt, Turned to dust by their never-ending tracks. They strangled the whale in the Thames, They killed the buffaloes on the Plains, They made the Sahara and stopped the rains, And they made the gate in the Ozone Layer, All the while laughing at Lorien's prayer. And now they're at the door-step; I see them outside my window. They dance around the dead trees and make the earth glow In fire and flame. They shoot the birds from the sky For sport. They bring the sun nearer with their chains, Stopping the rains, making the flesh cry For mercy, making the winds scream for change, Causing the oceans to toss and tumble, Madly trying to escape the heat, And only then do they mumble Of what they have done, Of the planet they have beaten To a pulp. Only then do they realize That they have taken the stars from my eyes, That they have turned the greens and blues To browns and blacks and grayish hues.